A Different Path
by DemonLordGalm
Summary: After seeing his friends tortured and killed, Tatsumi turns away from his original goal and joins the assassin organization Night Raid, plotting to kill Prime Minister Honest and change the Empire for the better. He just didn't expect how it would take such a drastic turn from what he thought would happen. COMPLETED.
1. Prologue

A/N Hello my people and welcome to possibly another fanfic that I'm going to enjoy writing, since I recently got into AKame ga Kill and my god it is fucking awesome. This is also going to be new uncharted territory for me considering this is something out of my range, but I hope that I'll be able to craft a good fanfiction that'll bring enjoyment to my readers. And before I get any statements stating this or that, there will probably be some similarities to the Akame ga Kill fanfiction written by NaruHinadorable, and I'm going to say this right now this is going to be something I write entirely on my own and that I'm coming up with all of this one my own, which will become evident later on once I get deeper into the story. If I do end up having some portions that are similar, I'll play it safe and give credit to him. I really wanted to clear that up so as to not cause turmoil in the near future. By the way, I'm altering Tatsumi's age a little and making him a 19 year old, just putting that out there now.

Also, another thing I wanted to say is that later on in the future as more of this story is established, I will adding story information to the Wiki several other fanfiction authors and I created to showcase our information, known as FanFicCollective. I will announce of course when that information will be up and such.

Okay, that's it for my soapbox session, it's time to get on with the story. Leave a review telling me what you all think.

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 **A Different Path**

 **\- Part 1: A New Direction -**

* * *

 **Prologue**

It was as if one bad thing had come after another. Tatsumi's two friends had been brutally tortured and killed by a family who lived in the capital, but thankfully after the entire ordeal he had managed to find new friends in the form of Night Raid, a division of assassins wielding Teigu that were a part of the Revolutionary Army devoted to toppling the Empire's current regime. However, being assassins that were regarded as enemies to the Empire, it was bound to come with dire consequences.

Sheele, the wielder of Extase, was killed by a member of the Imperial Police. Bulat, the wielder of Incursio and Tatsumi's mentor, ended up dying after his former comrade and superior, Liver, poisoned him. These actions, meant to demoralize them, only strengthened their resolve to bring about change to the Empire and kill Prime Minister Honest for everything he has done.

They all just didn't see that this would be accomplished in an entirely different way then they expected.

 **\- Temporary Night Raid HQ -**

Team Stylish's attack on the base had at first come at a surprise, but when Najenda had arrived on an air manta with reinforcements from the Revolutionary Army's HQ, namely the human Teigu Susanoo and Chelsea, the battle ended fairly quickly thanks to Susanoo's overwhelming combat prowess.

The only reason that happened though was because the mad scientist had managed to follow Tatsumi there after he had fled from the Jaegers, which was a feat in its own since he had Incursio active. He wouldn't have been able to do so if he hadn't had the Teigu's Trump Card, or the Jaeger named Wave would've surely caught him and exposed his identity.

" _That would've been really, really bad._ " thought Tatsumi with a grimace.

Since their base had been trashed by the attack, and since the Revolutionary Army had to make a new one for them in a different location, the organization mobilized and travelled for a few days far into Danger Beast infested territory to not only train but to lay low. To make it more comfortable, Susanoo had built a house for them in a matter of minutes, which was astonishing by itself. But, what caught him off guard after a certain level of normalcy had been achieved once again was that after explaining what had occurred while he was a temporary member of the Jaegers, it was decided to send him back into the Capital so that he could gather more intelligence on them to better prepare for the eventual engagement between the two organizations.

"Uh, what?" asked Tatsumi with a slightly baffled look.

"Considering these recent events, I need you to sneak back into the capital and gather more information on the Jaegers. It would be essential for us to know more about our enemies so that we can exploit their weaknesses." said Najenda again, the order causing him to blink several times and delve deep into his subconscious.

" _Go...back…?_ " he thought, an image of the Jaeger members coming back.

They were their enemies, the organization created to hunt down and kill them. But, to be honest, being around them hadn't actually been that bad. In fact, it had felt almost normal, comfortable even.

Najenda could see the doubt and worry from the expression he had, and she couldn't blame him. The Jaegers were especially powerful and on his own he wouldn't be able to last long.

"We know it's dangerous, but you're Incursio's invisibility will allow you to penetrate deep into the capital without being noticed. And we're not asking you to meet with them personally, just observe them from afar. You'll be fine." she said with a small wink, Tatsumi glancing up and smiling at the reassurance.

Leone suddenly came up behind him, wrapped her arm around his neck and hugged him tightly, her usual casual grin plastered across her face.

"Just be sure to come back in one piece!" she exclaimed with a laugh, Tatsumi coughing when she squeezed a little too hard and started to cut off air to his lungs.

"Sis, can't...breath…!" he said through labored breaths, Leone giggling as she freed him from her death grip.

After coughing a couple more times and regaining his breath and composure, he stood up to his full height and clenched his fists tightly with a determined look on his face, "Yeah, I know. I'll be back."

With that, he briskly turned around and departed from the meeting hall, the doors closing behind him with a heavy thud and leaving the rest of Night Raid to their thoughts.

When silence returned to the large room, Leone crossed her arms and fixated her gaze on Najenda whilst her expression morphed from happiness to concern.

"Are you really sure about this Boss? Do you think he'll be alright?" she asked, doubtful of Tatsumi would be able to handle such an arduous task.

"I'm sure that he'll be able to do it with Incursio's Trump card, and Bulat believed him as well, so I will too. But...in the event that he does get caught and should perish…" she said, the members of Night Raid present minus Chelsea lowering their gaze. "I will take full responsibility for this mission and make it our goal to recover his body. It would be the right thing to do."

In Tatsumi's room, which had somehow been left untouched during the attack of Team Stylish, the young man himself was sitting down on his bed with Incursio's key resting idle in his lap, one had on the holt and the other on the blade.

He couldn't stop thinking about the idea of going back to the Jaegers, when he at first had considered them as his arch-enemies and the toughest obstacle standing in their way of assassinating the Prime Minister and changing the Empire for the better. After being among them, even if it was for just a short time, however, he had found out that they weren't monsters like some of the other residents of the Empire he's seen. Wave was one such person, the wielder of the Teigu Grand Chariot, Incursio's successor. That scary guy, Bols, he was actually a huge softie too, and that he actually regretted all of the actions that he had committed.

They had their faults, and to him he still considered them human.

" _Well, except that scientist and her. There's nothing sane about that girl._ " though Tatsumi with a heavy scowl when the face of Seryu Ubiquitous entered his mind like a virus., infecting his soul and causing him to feel sick to his stomach.

She had been the one to kill Sheele with her Teigu, that hellish dog she affectionately calls "Koro". Both he and Mine hated her with a passion since that demon of a quote-unquote _dog_ had eaten their beloved friend. Deep down he already made a commitment to himself that if he saw the opportunity he would kill her and that dog in the most brutal way possible as retribution for their fallen comrade.

"Well, I guess this is a good time to head out. It'll be easier to enter the capital undetected under the cover of darkness." he told himself as he slid Incursio into the strap over his back and walked over to the door.

Before he could grasp the knob it was pushed open towards him and he stepped back when Akame appeared in the doorway with her usual stoic expression. Without a word she embraced him and burrowed her face into his shoulder, Tatsumi taking a few seconds to overcome his surprise before reciprocating the hug.

"Promise me."

"What?" he asked, Akame looking up at him with eyes on the verge of tears.

"Promise me that you won't be caught. I don't want someone else close to me to die." she said, Tatsumi smiling as he placed both hands on her shoulders and looked her directly in the eye.

"Akame, I'm not planning on dying any time soon. I'm not gonna let myself perish until I see Prime Minister Honest dead. I promise you that."

She stared at him in silence before she too smiled and nodded, Tatsumi now relieved to see her in a better mood. They walked out of his room together, Tatsumi closing the door behind them before they navigated the branching hallways of the secret base so as to reach the entrance leading to the outside world.

The sun had just started its ascent into the sky and he had a long way to go to reach the capital, so Tatsumi turned to face Akame one last time and gave her a wink. "See you later."

He ran off towards the tree line of the forest surrounding the base and Akame watched him go, doubt still in her gaze. When he vanished into the foliage, the small smile she had dropped away and she worriedly tapped her foot against the dirt a few times.

" _Please, be safe._ "


	2. Incursion under Darkness

A/N Okay, now that I have the butterflies in my stomach out of the way I can get on with the first chapter. I think I'm going to have an interesting time with this story considering the characters I already have in mind that I'm going to introduce later on, especially one in particular. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 1 - Incursion under Darkness**

Tatsumi, with Incursio already active, landed on a tree branch and squinted to see the towering wall that protected the capital of the Empire. He could see the Imperial Palace from where he stood, and he was far enough away from the road leading up to the main gate so there was minimal risk of being discovered by the Imperial Police or the Jaegers.

" _Now I just have to wait for night._ " he thought with a slight smirk as he adjusted himself on the branch and leaned up against the trunk with his legs dangling over either side.

He deactivated Incursio and crossed over his arms before he closed his eyes and slowly drifted off into a light sleep, something he had gotten into a habit of doing ever since he became a member of Night Raid.

He didn't know how much time had passed when he finally woke up, but when he saw the starry night sky and the luminescent Moon looking back down at him and he smirked as he stood up and stretched, Incursio's key already in his grasp. Silently he activated the Teigu and was draped in its armor once again, the cape it sported flapping softly in the night breeze.

" _Time to go._ "

He leaped off the tree branch and went from one to another until he flew up high over the wall he had spotted earlier on in the day and landed softly on an adjacent building. He looked out across the still bustling city and hopped over a street to another grouping of houses.

He silently ran across the interconnected roof tiles with Incursio's invisibility activated and came to a halt when he came to a courtyard below him. He kneeled down and observed the crowd of night goers for a few minutes, trying to see if any of them were out of the ordinary, since he knew that the Jaegers typically stood out.

When he caught a flash of white and blue out of the corner of his eye, he grinned. " _There you are._ "

He dropped down onto the cobblestone road within an alleyway and came out into the light, taking his time in approaching the two Jaeger members he had spotted from his vantage point. If memory serves the man with blue hair was Wave and the other man with the white mask was Bols.

"It's nice to be able to walk around once in awhile and just relax, right Bols?" asked Wave as he shoved his hands into pants pockets.

"Yes, it is. Seeing the city at night like this is always something I enjoy." replied Bols as they maneuvered around a shop stall and down an adjacent street.

When they entered the smaller road Wave got a slight chill up his spine and he glanced over his shoulder, but he found no one to be there.

Bols noticed the action and asked, "Are you okay Wave? Is something the matter?"

"No, I'm fine. I just got a chill, that's all." he replied as he turned back and resumed his stroll, their unseen pursuer sighing in relief.

" _Note to self, Wave has a good sixth sense._ " thought Tatsumi as he pushed off the wall he had leaned up against.

He continued tailing the two Jaeger members from a safe distance throughout the capital, passing by the capital's citizens who weren't even aware of his presence. He noticed that Bols and Wave talked for a good amount throughout their journey, something he could relate to.

" _They must be good friends if they can talk casually like this for such a long time. Reminds me a lot of being in Night Raid._ "

Tatsumi growled under his breath and clenched his fists in frustration. "*If only we weren't on opposite sides. If we were to work together to take down the Empire…"

The thought of having two exceptionally strong teams of Teigu users work together to take down the Empire wasn't out of the ordinary, but if there was even the *slightest chance that it could become a reality, he would take it in a heartbeat.

When Bols and Wave entered another large clearing within the city, Tatsumi grinned when by chance they met up with some of the other Jaegers, one he recognized as Run and the other...His heart skipped a beat and it took every single last shred of his will to restrain himself and his anger.

It was Seryu Ubiquitous, the now former member of the Imperial Police that had that been the one to kill Sheele. That demonic dog of hers had eaten her, and of course it was standing right next to her with that blank expression it always had on when not ravenously attacking anyone she deemed "evil".

Tatsumi had to unclench his fists and stretch the fingers out when they started to hurt because of how tight he had his fingers closed. She had a smile on her face as she greeted Wave and Bols, but deep down he knew that she was a twisted and psychotic murderer who deserved to have her head separated from her shoulders.

"Keep it cool, keep it cool. They'll detect your presence if you get angry." he told himself as he slowly calmed himself down and maintained a heavy scowl on his face as he observed the Jaegers from afar.

"Hello Seryu, Run. What brings you out here in the city at night?" asked Bols after he received a hug from Seyru.

"It was starting to get stuffy back at the mansion, so we decided to take a stroll." she replied as Bols bent down and pat Koro on top of the head affectionately.

"What about Kurome? Is she still there?" asked Wave, Tatsumi tuning in when he heard the mentioning of Akame's little sister.

"She was asleep when we left, and I doubt she'll wake up any time soon." said Run when they all started to casually walk down the brightly lit corridor between the houses, Tatsumi following quietly.

" _So Akame's little sis is a heavy sleeper, good to know._ " he thought as he mentally wrote down the note inside his brain for future reference.

He followed them around for at least another hour, having to resort to travelling by rooftop so as to let himself rest by deactivating Incursio's invisibility, before, just like any other sane person, they decided to head back to the mansion he had been at previously. Tatsumi couldn't help but smirk at how much he's been able to do, so when he had recovered enough of his strength he turned invisible once again and started to follow.

It didn't take long for them to arrive at the luxurious mansion he remembered coming to, Tatsumi left staring in awe once again at its architecture and overall size. He watched the four Jaegers enter through the front double doors and disappear inside, which allowed him the chance to circle the property and get an accurate reading of its layout to go alongside with his previous time inside.

Although, upon arriving back at the mansion, he couldn't help but feel something deep down, something he just couldn't place. After making several loops around the mansion, he looked to the sky and leaped up onto the roof and creeped along over the tiles, trying to make as little noise as possible.

" _God damn, if I were to be discovered here and now...that would be exceptionally bad._ " he thought to himself with a grimace as he dropped down onto a lower section of the roof and found himself a nice nook to sit still in and wait for a few minutes for the mansion to become totally silent.

To conserve more of his energy, he deactivated Incursio entirely and hid himself in the shadows so as to avoid being spotted if indeed there was someone or something keeping an eye out for intruders. He looked up into the starry night sky and estimated it to be around sometime after midnight based upon the position of the Moon.

He yawned silently and rubbed his eyes, the tiredness in his limbs starting to become apparent now that he had sat down. He waited for a few more minutes, fighting to keep back the feeling of drowsiness arising from within, before, after making the assumption that everyone inside the mansion had fallen asleep, he stood up and cracked his back and neck.

" _I guess now it's time to get out of here._ " he told himself as he creeped along the edge of the roof, passing by the darkened windows of a few rooms he checked were empty before traversing across.

All of a sudden he came to a halt when he rounded the corner of the roof, the window a few feet in front of him wide open and giving off a slight luminescent glow he associated with candle light.

He silently activated Incursio and turned invisible so as to approach the window, his eyes slowly peering around the corner into the room and in an instant he jerked back behind cover.

After taking a few moments to gather himself, he slowly looked back around the corner and held his gaze, observing the individual within the room beyond in utter silence. It was the Ice Queen herself, the leader of the Jaegers and the Empire's Strongest General. The room's layout was just like he had remembered it, with the bed in one corner closest to the window and a desk off on the side, which was where she was currently sitting at.

From his perspective he could see she was writing something down in a small book resting on the desk's surface. There was a glass of wine sitting close to her right hand and, like he suspected, there was a pair of candles that provided light for her to see.

" _I wonder what she's doing?_ " he thought, his own curiosity trumping his mind telling him to leave while he can.

Inside the room, Esdeath set down the pencil she was using and leaned back in her chair, sighing. She looked up at the ceiling and tapped the floor with her bare foot a couple of times. She was dressed in her usual nightly attire, a white sleeping gown with short sleeves, and what she had finished wasn't any sort of battle planes or anything.

" _I never thought I would be doing something like this...It's all your fault, Tatsumi._ " she thought with a small smile as she glanced back down at the journal and moved the pencil aside.

The crude drawing of the one she loved, in her eyes, wasn't even close to his likeness, but it was all she had. After he had managed to slip away from her, she couldn't help but feel empty inside.

A slight breeze entered the room through the window she had opened earlier and she glanced at it, taking in a deep breath and closing the journal.

She took a sip of her wine and shivered slightly when the liquid slid down her throat and burned slightly. The person she knew was lurking just outside the window would have to wait while she finished the drink, since it was her favorite.

" _They're brave, I'll give them that_." she thought as she set down the wine and closed her eyes, her hand gravitating the to tattoo of her Teigu on her chest just above her breasts.

She could feel the warmth it gave off every so often, most commonly while in the heat of battle where her Teigu reigned supreme, but recently it would grow warm due to these new, unorthodox feelings she now possessed.

"I know that we'll meet again, Tatsumi…" she said, her smile growing. "And when that time does arrive, you will be mine."

Outside, Tatsumi could barely hear what she had said, but he had in fact heard just enough for him to piece together the rest and withdraw from the window. " _She really is in love with me…_ "

He glanced down and felt the strange feeling he had before when he had first arrived back at the mansion after tailing the Jaegers. Before he couldn't comprehend what it meant, but now that he had seen the other side of the Empire's strongest for the second time, a renewal of hope bloomed inside him that said there was still a chance to convert her.

" _And maybe, just maybe...there might be a chance to have the others defect as well!_ "

Before he could contemplate further a hand appeared from around the window and grasped his shoulder, his eyes widening and a yelp escaping from his lips as he was dragged back through the opening and hurled towards the adjacent wall. His head struck the wall with such force that it jarred his vision and knocked him out cold, Incursio immediately vanishing in a puff of smoke with just its key remaining in his grasp.

Esdeath breathed out and smirked at her successful ambush, turning around to view her unwanted guest and hopefully torture him or her as to why they were spying on her. These thoughts were immediately driven from her mind when she recognized the person just off his hair alone.

"Tatsumi!" she gasped, her first thought being to check if he was okay.

She walked over to him and got down on her knees before she grabbed onto his shoulders and rolled him over to where his head rested on her lap. His expression was almost tranquil, but she couldn't help but smile. She moved aside a few strands of hair that covered his face and stared at him, the hand on his chest feeling it rise and fall with every breath he took.

" _He's just knocked out…_ " she thought thankfully as she gingerly picked up Tatsumi so as not to disturb him and carried him over to her bed.

She set him down on the sheets and continued to watch him, his steady breathing and the peaceful expression on his face causing her hidden to slowly bubble up to the surface. After mere moments of restraint she couldn't hold back any longer and climbed up onto the bed, her cheeks turning a deep shade of red when she straddled him.

Esdeath poked Tatsumi's cheek with her finger and giggled when his nose shrivelled up slightly and he grumbled to himself.

She traced his shoulders and through his jacket she could feel his well developed muscles, something she found to be pleasantly surprising.

"He's so...perfect…" she thought when her chest started to get warm again, the feeling soon spreading to the rest of her body.

Internally she was struggling with repressing her urges, and it seemed that they would end up winning when she squirmed slightly due to the position she was in. It was almost painful to hold back.

In the end, however, she regained control over herself and her emotions and got up off of Tatsumi and sat down beside him at the end of the bed with her hands resting in her lap.

" _I'll wait for him to wake up. I just hope I didn't throw him into the wall too hard…_ "

A few minutes passed and eventually the waiting paid off when Tatsumi snorted and groaned as he picked himself up and rubbed his head, the pain of striking the wall at such a high speed still lingering. After opening his eyes it only took him a second to realize where he was and he tensed up, his limbs locking in place.

"Oh god, please tell me I'm dead."

A laugh emanated from the end of the bed and he looked up, seeing the sadistic Ice Queen looking straight back at him with a smile. The moonlight coming in through the window reflected off her long flowing blue hair and he had to admit, deep down, she actually looked quite beautiful.

" _Wait, where did that come from? She just threw me up against a wall with such force that if I hadn't been in Incursio the impact would've broken my neck._ " he told himself in his thoughts.

"No, you're not dead. And I 'm sorry for throwing you against the wall, Tatsumi." she said, Tatsumi rubbing the back of his neck.

"It's fine, I just have a headache now is all. It'll go away later." he replied.

He looked up at her again after massaging his neck and hearing a satisfying pop when he stretched it and could tell that there was something bothering her, she had that look on her face. "O _h no, I hope she didn't see that I was in Incursio. That would be hard to explain._ "

"I want to ask you a question." she stated, Tatsumi gulping nervously when she brought her legs and scooted closer to him. "Why did you come back after saying you would join the Revolutionary Army?"

" _So she still remembers me saying that, and she seems to be fine with it. I guess that's a step in the right direction, but I hadn't expected for this to happen._ "

He licked his lips while he tried to come up with an answer, but before he could say anything Esdeath's overwhelming killer intent struck him like a raging Danger Beast, the Ice Queen staring coldly, "Don't lie to me. I have methods to get the information out of you."

" _Shit._ "

Tatsumi nodded slowly and he prepared himself, his throat feeling a little dry. His life was on the line here, and he couldn't possibly imagine a situation worse then this right now. However, instead of succumbing to his fear, he buried it deep down and pressed on.

"O-Okay, I won't. The reason why I came here was, well...I was sent here."

"What do you mean?" asked Esdeath, Tatsumi biting his tongue.

It was either be alive for a few more minutes or be tortured. He chose the obvious answer, of course.

"It was a mission. I-I'm sorry, but I'm a member of Night Raid."

In a flash Tatsumi was pinned to the bed by Esdeath, a knife made entirely of ice with jagged edges getting pressed against his throat appearing a second later.

"I should kill you right now, saying that to me." she hissed viciously, her eyes narrowed like a predator about to deal the final blow to its prey.

Tatsumi's mind was racing just as fast as his heart was, the words he wanted to say now jumbled up and thrown about within his subconscious. What he said next would determine if he lived or died, and he would like it very much if the former happened.

"Just hear me out!" he bellowed, the sudden change in his tone catching Esdeath off guard and causing her to hesitate.

" _Such power in his voice…_ " she thought, Tatsumi's steely gaze making her hand move the knife a fraction of an inch away from his throat.

"I only joined Night Raid to avenge the deaths of my friends who were tortured and killed upon coming to the Capital. I know you remember me saying this from last time, but the Empire is corrupted and it needs to be changed. Prime Minister Honest _needs_ to die. That was my reason for joining, to bring about change so that people can live without fear." he explained without messing up a single word, Esdeath beginning to become admired by his resolve once again.

"And when I was ordered to come back here, to the Jaegers, I was the only one sent here and to be honest, I felt a little glad. I get the feeling of being at home when I'm there with Night Raid, but the same thing happens here. It feels comfortable."

Tatsumi glanced down at the knife hovering dangerously close to his throat and he noticed that her grip around its handle slackened ever so slightly, meaning that he was actually getting through to her. While he was talking, he also had felt something inside him change as well. It was the feeling he had gotten upon coming back to the Jaegers headquarters, the one he couldn't place nor identify.

It all made sense now.

"There's something else too, another feeling that I only recently discovered I had when I came back here." Tatsumi continued, Esdeath watching him carefully as he slowly brought himself up to eye level with her and pushed aside her knife.

He placed his hands on her shoulders and looked her directly in the eyes, her previous anger vanishing with the changing of her cheeks to an even darker shade of red then before.

"The real reason why I feel like this is not because of the other Jaegers, it's because of you. I-I think I like you, Esdeath."

Her eyes widened and, as a result of her shock, the ice knife in her hand dissipated into tiny particles that faded away in an instant. "A-Are you…?"

"You told me not to lie, right?" asked Tatsumi with a grin, Esdeath staring at him for a few seconds before she smiled and wrapped her arms around his neck and hugged him.

"I told you that you would be mine." she whispered into his ear, Tatsumi rolling his eyes.

"Yeah, yeah, I get it. But about what I said earlier…"

"You do realize that the Prime Minister is my superior, correct? Stating that you'll kill him to a General of the Empire is treason." said Esdeath as they withdrew from one another.

"I know, but he's the one who's been causing all of the pain and suffering throughout the Empire. He's weak for exploiting others, and it pisses me off that no one can touch him because he has the Emperor wrapped around his finger. Don't tell me you can't see it." said Tatsumi with a heavy scowl, Esdeath lowering her gaze and sighing.

"I do…" Instantly her expression transformed once again into one that can inspire fear in anyone. "But I cannot betray him as a General in service to the Emperor."

" _Damn, this is gonna be harder then I thought._ "

"At least humor me and entertain the idea, okay?" asked Tatsumi, Esdeath returning to her previous personality as she nodded once.

"Fine, but this matter has not been settled. I will not be changed."

"You underestimate my abilities, Esdeath." he said with a smirk, Esdeath eying him before she smiled and positioned herself to where he could wrap an arm around her as they laid down side by side in the bed sheets.

He couldn't help but blush uncontrollably when she pressed her body up against his, her warm breath spreading over his neck. Maybe it was because of the raging headache he still had from being launched at Mach 2 right into the wall, but he thought that maybe, just maybe, this wouldn't be so bad after all.


	3. Welcome Back to the Jaegers

A/N Seems this story seems to be getting along well, and it's only at the prologue and first chapter. I have a lot of things planned for this story, so I hope you guys will stick around with me for the long run. Also, I have the character pages for Tatsumi, Akame, Leone and Najenda done on FanficCollective. They will be subject to change as the story progresses, of course. I also created a page for Teigu that have been seen in the story beforehand and currently, and just like the character pages, when I introduce a new Teigu, which I WILL because why not, I will update accordingly. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 2 - Welcome Back to the Jaegers**

The Jaeger's mansion was dead silent, the early rays of sunshine from its morning rise just beginning to peek over the horizon on the capital of the Empire. Their brilliant colors slowly creeped through the windows of every house and building, brightening up the rooms they protected and silently telling their occupants it was the dawn of a new day.

When a stray ray of sunshine struck Tatsumi's face he shifted slightly in his position on the bed. His eye lids cracked open and he yawned as his brain began to function at full capacity after coming out of the doldrums of sleep.

" _Thank god the headache I had last night is gone._ " he thought as he rubbed his eyes and tried to get up, but soon found he couldn't.

He looked over his shoulder and smiled when he figured out the reason why. Esdeath was still fast asleep beside him, her arms wrapped around his waist and a tranquil expression on her face. He wouldn't even dare wake her up, so instead he decided to accept his fate and shrug.

" _I guess I'm stuck here until she wakes up._ " thought Tatsumi as he settled back onto the covers and watched the sun continue its ascent into the sky through the window.

"Tatsumi…" mumbled Esdeath under her breath, Tatsumi chuckling to himself when he felt her grip around him tighten.

She said something else, but he couldn't tell what the words were, so he listened closely and remained perfectly silent so the next time she spoke he would be able to understand. A few seconds passed by and he squirmed slightly when he felt Esdeath tighten her grip a little more, inadvertently causing her breasts to press themselves up against his back.

"No...Tatsumi…" she said, Tatsumi raising an eyebrow in confusion.

" _What is she dreaming about?_ " he thought when his curiosity overtook his over emotions.

"Tatsumi...not here...we might be seen…" murmured Esdeath huskily, Tatsumi's eyes shooting wide open and his cheeks turning dark red.

He knew that she was in love with him, that was a given because of her attitude around him, but who could've guessed that Esdeath, the Empire's Strongest General and probably the scariest person to ever meet on the battlefield, had erotic dreams about him.

"I don't know if I should be flattered or really creeped out…" he whispered quietly to himself so as not to disturb her slumber.

"About what…?"

Apparently his statement had been loud enough to wake her up, because now her eyes were half open and she was staring at that back of Tatsumi's head with an eyebrow raised up.

"Uh…"

"Was I...saying things?" she asked quietly, Tatsumi managing a glance over his shoulder before he slowly nodding.

"It's your fault because you left me...I couldn't stop thinking about you and, well, I kept having these dreams…" she said, Tatsumi starting to feel guilty now that she was playing that card.

"I'm sorry. I-"

Before he could finish his sentence Esdeath removed her arms from around his waist and grabbed him by the shoulder, turning him around until she could look him directly in the eyes.

"Promise me you won't ever leave again. I don't show this side to anyone, but...I felt empty without you around." she said with the utmost seriousness in her tone, Tatsumi able to see she meant every word just from her expression alone.

He blinked once before smiling, Esdeath blushing when he reached down and held her hand in his own. Last night when he had told her he shared the same feelings she had for him, deep down he still held some doubt for those words. But now it was different. His heart and mind were one and the same on the decision he was about to make.

"I promise I won't ever leave your side." he stated clearly with every fiber of his being.

Esdeath smiled at him, her blust still clearly evident on her cheeks, before she leaned over with her lips with her lips slightly pursed.

Unlike the first time, when it had come as a surprise, this time around Tatsumi accepted the kiss from Esdeath and passionately returned her feelings. Before anything could really escalate between them a knock resonated from the door, a slightly muffled voice following soon after. "Captain? Are you awake?"

It was Wave, Tatsumi could tell based on the tone and the voice alone.

"Yes, I'll be out in a moment." replied Esdeath after she withdrew from Tatsumi and crawled off the bed, her destination a closet close to her desk.

Tatsumi pushed himself off the sheets and took some time to stretch his arms and rid himself of the soreness in his limbs. After that was he turned away and kept his gaze averted when he heard Esdeath begin to undress and change into her normal General's attire.

She glanced back at him and giggled silently to herself at his innocence. Instead of saying anything she finished dressing and grabbed her cap, walking over to Tatsumi afterwards and tapping him on the shoulder as she placed it on top of her head and made sure it was straightened.

"Let's go get breakfast. Bols should already be cooking."

Tatsumi's stomach growled his response for him and he grinned. " _My thoughts exactly._ "

They approached the door and Esdeath opened it, Wave getting off the wall beside it and standing back to allow her through.

When Tatsumi followed her out he nearly jumped out of his skin in shock, since he wasn't quite expecting to see him again. "Tatsumi?! When did you get here?"

"Hey Wave…" he said with a cheesy smile.

Esdeath motioned to him with her hand and he bent down low enough so that she could whisper into his ear. As she spoke the expression on his face remained indifferent at first before, all of a sudden, it was flushed with anger that was directed right at Tatsumi. As soon as it appeared however it vanished, replaced once again with apathy when Esdeath finished.

"I see…" he said as he returned to his full height and glared at Tatsumi, his gaze giving him an uneasy feeling.

He was thrown for a loop when he held a hand up to him and grinned, "It's good to have you back."

Tatsumi looked at him awkwardly before he held his own hand up and shook Wave's, saying, "T-Thanks."

"And by the way, Tatsumi, your secret's safe with me." he said with a wink, Tatsumi raising an eyebrow before he guess what he meant by secret and nodded.

The three started their walk down the hallway on their way to the dining room, passing by several closed doors Tatsumi assumed to be either empty or owned by the other Jaegers. Wait, the Jaegers. They would be surprised to see him too. How would he be able to explain his sudden reappearance? What questions would they ask?

The thoughts began to swirl around in his mind and he started to feel apprehensive about meeting with them again, but when Esdeath intertwined her hand with his and smiled at him, he couldn't help but feel at ease. It was like she was silently telling him that everything would be fine. When they finally reached the dining hall Wave opened the door and walked in first, Esdeath and Tatsumi following behind.

As soon as he entered through the doorway the smell of Bols' cooking struck Tatsumi like a horde of bricks, his mouth already beginning to salivate when memories of the first time he tried the man's cooking came back like a flood. It had caught him off-guard when he learned that, despite his scary appearance, he could cook better then anyone else he knew.

The other Jaegers, like he suspected, were surprised to see him back. Before he could say anything, however, Esdeath stepped forward and gave them all a quick explanation stating he had to leave to retrieve some of his possessions, leaving out the part about being sent here as a member of Night Raid.

" _Well, I guess former member now._ " thought Tatsumi somewhat regretfully.

He was drawn out of his thoughts when Esdeath finished and in an instant the other Jaegers had a complete change of attitude and were smiling and welcoming him back like a long lost friend.

"It's nice to see you again Tatsumi, I'm glad you were able to return safely." said Bols courteously while Run simply nodded at him, Seryu saluted him alongside Koro, and Kurome waved her hand.

"Yeah, thanks Bols." he replied as he took his seat next to Wave and Esdeath, the other Jaegers settling themselves in for the meal Bols had cooked.

After a few minutes of silent eating Seryu looked over at Esdeath and with an inquisitive looked on her face she asked, "So what are our orders going to be for today, Captain?"

Esdeath set down her fork and rested her elbows on the table, her chin on her hands as she browsed her thoughts for the answer.

"I've been thinking of that, and there's really only one thing I came up with." she said, her gaze shifting from one Jaeger to the next.

She smiled and shrugged. "Nothing."

"Eh, what?" asked Wave, confused as to what she meant.

"I just thought we could take the day off, walk around the capital. Earlier on I found this place that serves good ice cream, so we can stop by there for a few."

"That actually sounds like a wonderful idea. There are still parts of the city I have yet to see." said Run as he thoughtfully began to plan his route.

"So it's settled. We'll leave after breakfast?" asked Esdeath, a simultaneous yes coming from each Jaeger before they delved back into the food on their plates.

True to her word, as soon as they finished eating and the plates had been cleaned, they departed from the mansion and headed out into the city to explore.

Esdeath to them to the store she had mentioned and they spent some time there dining on the sweets they served, Tatsumi staying with Esdeath the entire time and sharing some laughs with Wave and Kurome while at the same time staying as far away from Seryu as possible without it looking suspicious.

As the day went on and the longer they spent out and about, the faster time seemed to fly by. It was half past noon when Esdeath decided to split off from the group and return to the mansion with Tatsumi. It seemed like an innocent reason on its own, she had some things to attend to, but the hidden truth behind the statement was that she just wanted to spend some alone time with him without interference.

Upon returning to the comforts of the Jaegers HQ, Esdeath changed into a more casual attire composed of jeans and a t-shirt that revealed some of her cleavage. She also tied up her hair into a single ponytail, and Tatsumi had to admit that she looked cute.

"I think this is what people would consider a "date", right?" she asked as they took a stroll through the expansive garden located in the center of the mansion.

"I guess so. Although there is something we're missing." stated Tatsumi with a small smile, Esdeath looking at him in intrigue.

"What?"

"Well, aside from me being from Night Raid and you a General of the Empire, we don't really know anything else about one another." he said as he turned and faced her. "What I'm saying is we should get to know each other a little more."

She blushed at how close he had gotten to her and she nodded once, the pair walking over to a cherry blossom tree and sitting down underneath its branches. Tatsumi rested up against the tree's trunk while Esdeath leaned up against his arm and placed her head on his shoulder, her long blue hair spread out at her feet.

"You start." she said, Tatsumi chuckling.

"Where to begin...Well, I came to the capital from my village with my two friends so that we could make a life for ourselves and send back money any chance we got." he said, Esdeath intently listening as started to recount his past up to this point.

"They were the one's murdered, right?" she asked, Tatsumi nodding.

"Yes."

"Then I'll find the people responsible and have them tortured. They hurt you, so they'll pay." said Esdeath darkly, but Tatsumi squeezed her hand and shook his head.

"No, it's fine, they're already dead. I killed the daughter, and my friends in Night Raid killed the mother and father. In fact, that's actually how I ended up in Night Raid."

Esdeath nodded and her expression softened again, silently telling him to continue. He pressed onward and told her about his experiences as a member of Night Raid, Esdeath saying nothing while she listened to every single detail. When he did finished he glanced down at her, expecting her to be angry for everything he had done against the Empire, but in fact he got the exact opposite.

"You would go far to avenge your friends...And you're really serious about changing the Empire too…"

"I'm sorry if that angers you, considering you work for Honest. And I apologize for killing officers of the Empire too." muttered Tatsumi, but Esdeath shook her head and waved the matter aside.

"They died because they were weak. You lived because your will was stronger then theirs. That's all there is to it."

That ideology of hers again. That was one of the things about her he disliked, the other being her sadism and willingness to torture people. She said she wouldn't be changed, but he was still hopeful.

"And yes I am serious about changing the Empire, and I know that we can do it together. You have been thinking about it since last night, right?" asked Tatsumi, Esdeath remaining still for a few seconds before she slowly nodded her head.

"Somewhat, yes."

"That's music to my ears. Thank you, I appreciate it." said Tatsumi before he squeezed her hand again, Esdeath's smile returning. "Now it's your turn."

"Ask away." she replied.

"Hmm...where is your Teigu, exactly? The sword I carry is the key for Incursio, but what allows you to create your ice? It can't be that rapier of yours, or is it?" he asked, Esdeath shifting herself forward and propping herself up.

To his surprise and extreme discomfort she threw one of her legs over him and sat down on his waist, their eyes on the same plane. She was straddling him, and he could feel his cheeks get warmer with each passing second, but his mind pushed that matter to the side when she brought his hand up and placed his index finger on the tattoo on her chest.

"My Teigu is in me. It's my blood." she stated, Tatsumi's eyes widening.

"Really? What's it called?"

"Demon's Extract. It was crafted from the blood of a Super-Class Danger Beast that lived in the northern parts of the Empire." she explained with some fondness in her tone when she mentioned the northern territories.

"Can it be removed?" asked Tatsumi.

She shook her head. "No, it can't. Once I drank the blood it fused with my own and I became its only user. The only way someone else can become a user is if they take my blood and inject it into themselves. And since I drank the entire thing, even a small portion is extremely potent and powerful."

Esdeath removed his hand from her skin and Tatsumi marvelled at the tattoo for a few more seconds, the Teigu she wielded astounding him. Incursio was definitely powerful, but being able to form and manipulate ice from nothing was a highly versatile tool.

" _That just proves why she's regarded as the strongest in the Empire._ " he thought before he was pulled out of his subconscious by Esdeath, who was holding his hand in both of hers and playing with his fingers.

"Okay, next question. When you talked about the Northern Territories you seemed to be a little fond of them. Is that where you were from?" asked Tatsumi.

"Yes, I was born in the Northern Territories, but not among the main tribes. I was born into a separate tribe called the Partas Clan. We exclusively hunted Danger Beasts and kept ourselves alive off of their meat. My father was the clan chief too." said Esdeath with a smile, some vivid memories of her childhood coming back to her.

"What happened to them?" questioned Tatsumi, Esdeath's smile disappearing.

"They were attacked by a rival clan. Everyone was killed, including my father. I was the only survivor." she stated with a dark scowl.

Tatsumi was shocked at how Esdeath's childhood had taken such a drastic turn for the worse and he couldn't help but feel sorry for her. "I'm sorry that happened. If I opened up any old wounds too I apologize for that as well."

"It's okay, that's all I'm the past now." she replied, her attitude brightening up again when she continued to play with his fingers.

"Anything else?" she asked.

Tatsumi racked his brain for anything else, but found nothing. So instead, he took the easy route. "Favorite color."

"Really? Is that the best you can come up with? My favorite _color_?" she asked with a grin, Tatsumi shrugging.

"It's a legitimate question."

Esdeath rolled her eyes and laughed before she thought for a moment and said, "It's yellow."

"Yellow?" questioned Tatsumi, Esdeath nodding her head a few times. "The Empire's Strongest General's favorite color is yellow?"

"Well what's yours then?" she asked, Tatsumi shaking his from side to side. "Don't lie to me."

Tatsumi chuckled again as he looked her in the eyes and said, "Blue."

"What shade?"

"I didn't ask you for a shade, why me?"

"Because I want to know!" she stated. Now it was Tatsumi's turn to roll his eyes as he sucked in a breath through his nostrils and sighed.

"Light blue, like your hair."

Esdeath blushed and she averted her gaze, Tatsumi laughing at her sudden shyness. She glared at him and she smirked when a dirty thought came to her mind. She picked her head back up and poked him in the chest, eying him closely.

"I have another question."

"Shoot." he said, Esdeath's smirk getting wider.

She leaned forward and quietly whispered something into his ear, Tatsumi's expression slowly morphing from casual humor to shock. He blinked a couple of times and checked to make sure he heard correctly as she sat back and looked at him with her hands still clasped around his.

"W-What made you think of that? And besides, if I did-"

"Did you really believe me when I said I some quick matters to attend to while we were walking through that park?" she asked, Tatsumi gulping once before he frowned and sighed.

"Yes…" he muttered, Esdeath giggling as she started to rock back and forth over his midsection, Tatsumi's cheeks becoming bright red as he felt her through his pants.

"Tatsumi...when you left, I felt lonely without you, and now that you're back I've been restraining myself this entire time. I-I can't hold back any longer." she said.

Finally it dawned on him. That was the real reason why Esdeath had wanted to come back to the mansion with him so early. Sure it was to spend some time with him without any disturbances, but just by the look on her face now Tatsumi realized that she desperately wanted him, and to be honest the feeling was mutual.

Despite some of her personality traits, she well and truly loved him, and he loved her. And now that she was asking him...he couldn't quite hold back himself.

"Esdeath…" he uttered, the woman sitting just inches away from him inching forward and closing her eyes.

They kissed again, Esdeath pressing her body up against his as their lips joined together and shared their emotions for one another. "Esdeath, I love you…" he said after pulling apart for a fraction of a second.

"I love you...Tatsumi." she replied back before pressing her lips against his again and resuming what they had briefly put on hold to get the words out.

As they kissed, Esdeath continued to grind her hips against his waist, her hidden desires beginning to take hold the more intimate they got. Without saying a word she pulled back and Tatsumi watched in awe as she slipped her fingers underneath her shirt and began to raise it up toward her shoulders.

"Tatsumi...please…" she said huskily as she stripped off the shirt and tossed it to the side, revealing to him her totally bare breasts.

This was the spark that lit the fires of passion and lust within them. In a matter of seconds Esdeath was unbuckling his pants belt with a hungry look in her eyes while Tatsumi undid the buttons to her jeans and started to pull them off her legs.

"Grab my breasts…" said Esdeath after she kicked off her pants, Tatsumi reaching up and taking her entire right breast into his hand and squeezing it.

She gasped when a tingling sensation spread throughout her entire body, the pleasure she was feeling beginning to overwhelm her other feelings and cause her mind to go blank in ecstasy. While he caressed her right breast Tatsumi used his mouth on the other, Esdeath moaning when she felt her nipple get sucked on.

Even after another minute of this, she still was not satisfied.

"Enough foreplay." she said through heavy breaths as she reached down and slipped off her panties while Tatsumi continued to play with her large breasts.

"I want you now...Tatsumi…"

Tatsumi nodded and he readjusted his position against the tree trunk while Esdeath reached back and procured a condom from her jeans pocket. She smiled at him with a heavy blush as she reached down and grasped his erect member in one hand while slipped on the condom with the other.

She positioned herself so that her wet sex was right over his cock and slowly lowered herself down, the tip passing by her folds and entering her.

Esdeath couldn't stop herself from gasping again the farther he went inside of her, and once she felt her thighs touch his waist she wrapped her arms around his neck to steady herself as wave after wave of pain and pleasure from her first time coursed through her veins like lightning.

"You're mine." she said to Tatsumi, who grinned.

"And you're mine." he replied back before they kissed again.

If there were still any doubts in his mind about if he had made the right decision, about joining the Jaegers and leaving his friends in Night Raid, they were immediately expunged from his thoughts.

This was where he belonged now, with the Jaegers and Esdeath. This was his home.


	4. Suspicions

A/N Score one for the boys back home. I'm liking this story more and more now, and I have so many ideas as to what I'll add in later. I've also done the character pages for all of the Jaegers as well. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 3 - Suspicions**

" ** _You fool...forsaking your friends for the enemy. What will you do if you meet them on the field of battle? Will you be so willing to protect your new so-called "friends" even though some have committed unspeakable atrocities themselves? Will you be able to even fight, let alone kill, your friends in Night Raid? Khehehe...I will take pleasure in watching you rip yourself apart, and in the aftermath, I'll be picking up the pieces…_** "

Tatsumi's eyes shot wide open and he groaned heavily, the dream he was having instantly fading away. He glanced over at Incursio's key resting up against a corner of Esdeath's desk, the sword staring back at him in utter silence.

" _That was...weird…_ " he thought as he rubbed his eyes to clear his vision up a little.

The day before was somewhat of a blur, but when he looked down and saw the peaceful expression on Esdeath's face as she slept with her head resting on his chest, he remembered almost instantly.

" _And judging by how warm it feels underneath the covers, I think we went to sleep without any clothes on._ " he thought with a silent chuckle.

When his stomach growled at him to get up, he smirked when Esdeath mumbled something incomprehensible under her breath.

He brought up his other hand still under the covers and with his index finger he gently ran it down the length of her spine, Esdeath shivering as a result of his touch. When she didn't wake up he resorted to another method in which he cupped her right butt cheek and squeezed, the soft flesh forming around his hand and finger tips.

Tatsumi grinned when Esdeath stiffened up and shifted slightly. He watched in mild amusement as her eyelids twitched and she opened one eye halfway to look at him.

"Good morning." he said as he left go of her and rested his hand on her back while she adjusted herself so that her arms were crossed underneath her chin on his chest.

"You okay?" she asked, Tatsumi nodding.

"Yeah, I just had this weird dream is all. What about you?"

"I feel _great_. What was your dream about?" she asked, Tatsumi shrugging.

"I don't know, to be honest. I can't remember what happened in it either." he said with a slight frown, Esdeath sighing happily as she pushed herself up with the covers slipping off her bare back.

"Well, now that I'm awake, I have to leave and take care of some business."

Tatsumi watched her climb off the bed, butt-naked, and walk over towards the shower door he remembered seeing upon his first time being in the room.

"Oh really? _Actual_ business?" he asked sarcastically, Esdeath glaring back at him over her shoulder with a smirk.

"Oh hush." she said as she opened the door and stepped inside, Tatsumi laughing.

It took her only a few minutes to shower and get herself clean, and once she was done they dressed together. Tatsumi was about to turn and head for the door but Esdeath stopped him and pulled something out from behind her back.

"Here, it's for you." she said as she held up a necklace, an interwoven string bearing a black cross hanging from it.

"It's the symbol of my army. No one will question you as long as this is around your neck." She slipped the necklace around Tatsumi's head and rested it on his chest.

"Thank you." said Tatsumi before picking up the cross and looking at the finished metal.

" _It's just like the ones the Three Beasts wore…_ "

"But that's not the only purpose it holds. Turn it over." said Esdeath with a smile, Tatsumi following her instructions and flipping the cross to its other side.

Implanted into the metal was a small heart made entirely of ice. Tatsumi ran his thumb over it's smooth surface and grinned at the slight chill it gave off.

"It's so that you always know that you are mine regardless of what anyone says." stated Esdeath as she blushed and toed the ground with her boot.

"I love it." replied Tatsumi before he motioned with his thumb at the door. "Now come on, let's get going."

 **\- Temporary Night Raid HQ -**

All of the members of Night Raid were assembled before Najenda in the house's meeting area, their expressions showcasing their concern and grim attitude towards the current situation.

"I can assume that all of you know why we're gathered here?" asked Najenda as she scanned each and every person standing before her.

Leone growled and Lubbock clenched his fists tightly. Susanoo stood next to Chelsea, who was silently sucking on one of her lollipops, with his arms crossed and eyes closed, and Mine was lightly tapping her foot on the floor. Akame was standing by herself directly before Najenda with her head held low, her hair covering up her eyes.

"It's been a full day since Tatsumi left to gather information on the Jaegers, and since we haven't heard anything from him either means several things could've happened." started off Najenda as she rested her prosthetic arm in her lap and inhaled a portion of her cigarette.

"One is that he could very well just be running late. We are dealing with the Jaegers here and he may have had to lay low for a while to avoid detection. But, unfortunately, there is another possibility in that he could've been captured. And finally, the last thing that could've happened..." she said, Akame stiffening in dread of what would come next. "...was that he was killed."

"He can't be dead. Tatsumi's got Incursio with him, so he should've been able to go invisible, right?" questioned Lubbock in defiance of the possible reality the third possibility posed.

"You're right, but we can't forget that he hasn't had it as long as Bulat did, so he wouldn't be able to stay invisible for too long." stated Leone with a glance at Lubbock, her expression completely devoid of any emotion.

"Plus, even though they're invisible, the user's presence can still be detected and sensed by someone skilled. Even Bulat knew that." said Mine, Lubbock growling in frustration while Najenda exhaled and blew out a smoke cloud.

"In any case, we won't know of Tatsumi's fate unless someone goes to the capital and finds out."

"Send me." said Akame as she raised her head up and glared at Najenda, dead serious. "I'll go."

"No, we need someone whom the Empire has no knowledge of yet." countered Najenda, quickly shutting Akame down.

Chelsea glanced from one woman to the other and smirked as she switched her lollipop over to the other cheek and stepped forward, Susanoo opening a single eye when he heard her move.

"I can do it. My Teigu enables me to transform my appearance into anyone at will."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, I'll be fine." said Chelsea with the wave of her hand, but in a quick second her expression lost all emotion. "I just need to know what I need to do once I find out."

Najenda closed her eye and sighed heavily, her own feelings on the matter coming out for a split second before she locked them away and stared right at Chelsea with a cold gaze.

"If he's alive, find out a way to send back word to us and we'll organize an operation to rescue him. If he's dead, then take back Incursio and bring it with you back here so we can find another suitable user. And if, by some unbelievable chance, that he has defected…" ordered Najenda, the members of Night Raid all looking at her with grim looks on their faces. "Then you have my permission to kill him through any means necessary. If you do not respond within a day, we'll assume the worst and we'll all come after you and Tatsumi, if the third possibility doesn't apply."

Chelsea nodded once before she turned on her heels and walked towards the room's exit in utter silence. In her mind she was already preparing herself for what she might have to do, and to be honest she didn't know if she would able to bring herself to kill Tatsumi if indeed he defected. From the short amount of time she had with him, she knew that he was a good person at heart and loyal to his friends.

" _I'll think about that later. Right now, I need to get all my stuff ready. And get more lollipops._ "

 **\- Jaegers HQ -**

 **\- 3 Hours Later -**

Wave and Tatsumi clashed once again with their swords, the sharpened edges of each blade grinding up against one another and producing a flurry of sparks.

"Not bad." said Wave with a grin as he disengaged and leaped back a few feet, Tatsumi eying him closely.

"It's not over yet. This battle's just beginning!" he exclaimed, Wave preparing himself for another charge.

Instead, to his surprise, Tatsumi stabbed his blade into the soft dirt of the training ground out back behind the mansion. The wind instantly began to whip around him and Wave held up his arms and squinted his eyes so that he could still see somewhat.

"Incursio!" he bellowed, a ring of fire roaring to life around him as a manifestation of the Teigu itself appeared behind him and crossed its arms, its yellow eyes glowing brightly.

"Oh so we're using our Teigu now?" exclaimed Wave excitedly when Tatsumi was encased within the nigh-impenetrable armor of Incursio and glared at him.

He held his arm out and the spear Neuntote materialized within his hand, its red blade glinting in the sunlight as he spun it around several times through his fingertips before gripping it tightly and pointing it right at Wave.

"Alright, I'll do the same! Grand Chariot!" shouted Wave at the top of his lungs as he summoned his Teigu in the same manner as Tatsumi.

Over on the side, standing far enough away so that they wouldn't get in the way, Seyru and Run were surprised when both combatants took the mock-fight to a whole other level and prepared themselves for what was to come.

"Oh, so they're going to use their Teigu now?" asked Seryu in awe of the two armor-type Teigu.

"This should prove to be an interesting fight, considering Incursio is the prototype to Grand Chariot." stated Run when Wave was consumed by Grand Chariot and took his usual combat stance, Tatsumi staring him down in utter silence.

"Really?" asked Seryu, Run nodding.

"Indeed. Both Grand Chariot and Incursio were forged from the same Danger Beast, a Super-class dragon-type by the name of Tyrant that could evolve and adapt to any environment it was in. Grand Chariot is considered the more advanced version over Incursio because it's always in a state of equilibrium."

"What about Incursio?"

Run narrowed his eyes and stared intensely at Tatsumi while he exchanged blows with Wave, the two seemingly an even match for one another.

"Incursio can be described as the incarnation of Tyrant itself. It's able to adapt and evolve just like the Danger Beast, gaining new forms and abilities as time goes on and the more foes it faces. It can also be forced to evolve if the user so desires. However, if the user forces an evolution too many times...it can lead to deadly consequences." explained Run with a slight grimace, Seryu looking from him and back to Tatsumi with wide eyes.

"Wow…"

Tatsumi rolled to the side to avoid a charging kick from Wave and swung out at his legs with Neuntote, the Jaeger backflipping into the air to avoid the attack. He landed on his feet and was about to rush Tatsumi again before the younger fighter suddenly dropped to his knees and coughed vigorously, some red electricity lancing out from Incursio.

"Dammit…!" he cursed in pain before he deactivated the Teigu and stabbed Incursio's key into the ground beside him, steam rising from its handle after he let go of it.

"Tatsumi!" exclaimed Wave as he quickly ran over to him, Grand Chariot disappearing in a matter of seconds. "Are you okay?"

Seryu and Run hustled over to his side and helped him up, Tatsumi thanking them before he looked down at Incursio's key with a baffled look on his face. "Yeah, I'm fine."

"What happened? Is that supposed to happen?" asked Seryu, Tatsumi holding back his feelings towards her and looking her in the eyes.

"No...no it's not. I have no idea what just happened, actually. I was fine at first, and then out of the blue, it got unbearable to wear."

"That is indeed strange…" stated Run as Tatsumi grasped Incursio's key again and found that it no longer was scorching hot, the metal now cool to the touch.

He hefted the sword and looked at it closely, the emblem in the center of the sword's hilt that resembled Tyrant's eye staring right back at him and seemingly glowing. "*I'll worry about this later…right now I think I'm going to pay Esdeath a visit."

 **\- Capital District Building No. 23, Reconditioning Department -**

 **\- One Hour Later -**

The plaque engraved onto the wall stated "Reconditioning Department", but everyone who walked by the massive metal box of a building close by to the Imperial Palace knew that reconditioning wasn't even close to describing what horrors took place beyond the windowless walls and beneath the very streets the building sat on.

This was the home of the capital's extensive torture chambers, with every single imaginable device built to inflict overwhelming amounts of pain to the human body stored inside. What made the building such a foreboding and ominous place was that anyone seen being led through the iron doors by Imperial policemen were never seen again, and if anyone got close to it and pressed their ear against the cold metal...one could hear the faint sound of screams coming from the poor unfortunate souls trapped inside.

And from time to time, when there was a specific task the usual staff of the chambers couldn't handle themselves, Esdeath was called in to perform the torturing herself. She had no qualms with torturing people, she enjoyed it actually. It had been a part of her life for a long time now.

Currently sitting before her on their knees with their hands bound behind their backs and dressed in pretty much rags were seven people, both male and female, sent to the torture chambers for treason against the Empire. Esdeath received the forms describing what kind of crimes they committed and briefly looked over them before handing them back to the Imperial policeman who escorted them here.

"Conspiring with the Revolutionary Army...the usual then. Eighty lashes, followed by an hour inside the iron maidens. If you all are even still alive after that, you'll get hung upside down by your ankles so that all the blood drains into your brain while at the same time you'll be given another set of eighty lashes." she said with a sadistic smile, a few of the poor victims sitting before her looking up in terror.

An equal number of torturers in black hoods walked up behind them and ripped open the back of their clothes, revealing their bare backs, and stepped back while unclipping whips from their belts. One of the torturers unrolled it and cracked it once in the air, one of the females jumping from the loud noise it produced. What made this method even worse was that imbedded into the ends of the whips were jagged shards of metal, making the usual pain received from a regular whip ten times worse.

They waited patiently, their eyes glued on Esdeath, for the General to give the command to begin. She was about to nod once as the signal for the torture to commence, but she got a slight chill up her spine and glanced back over her shoulder.

Her heart tightened up in her chest and her expression softened. "Tatsumi, I…"

He was standing in the doorway leading out of the stairwell that led down into the underground torture chamber, a look of horror painted all across his face. His eyes locked with hers and his expression changed from shock into a heavy scowl, pure anger swirling through him.

Esdeath tried to say something, but her words got stuck in her throat and she looked at him unable to say anything to explain herself. Tatsumi slowly shook his head in disgust before he briskly turned around and started back up the stairs.

"General? Is there a problem?" asked one of the Torturers, Esdeath glancing back at him for a few seconds before she sprinted toward the doors after Tatsumi.

She emerged out onto the street and the afternoon sun after ascending the staircase and spotted Tatsumi in the distance leaping from rooftop to rooftop away from her.

The chase was on, Esdeath quickly following him across the capital above the streets and citizens. After at least a minute of free-running she noticed him drop down behind some trees and followed him, arriving in the backyard of a fairly large mansion with a stand alone brick building a little ways behind it, visually contrasting the grandiose look of the mansion. Tatsumi was standing a couple of feet before its boarded up entrance, his arms hanging limp at his side.

"Tatsumi…?" asked Esdeath quietly, her voice almost a whisper.

"This was where it all started…" he said, his fists tightening in anger. "And of course the damn capital just covers it up...I despise this place."

Esdeath took a few steps forward closer to him, but he quickly turned his head and glared at her, his very gaze alone enough to stop her right in her tracks.

"Those people, what were they convicted of?" he asked of her with a hiss.

"Conspiring with the Revolutionary Army." replied Esdeath, Tatsumi laughing at the statement before looking away from her again.

"Bullshit. That is complete and total bullshit."

Esdeath was about to argue with him, but she held her tongue considering how volatile his emotions were and instead remained silent as he approached the boarded up building and grasped Incursio's key tightly in his hand.

"What rests behind this barrier is what made me realize what kind of hellhole the capital really is." he said aloud before, with a single slash, he cut through the wooden boards and opened the passage once again into the pitch black interior.

He stepped aside and motioned for her to walk inside, Esdeath gingerly walking by him and stepping over the splintered wood now littering the ground. Immediately she was paralyzed and rooted to the ground at what the inside of the building was really like. There was dried blood everywhere, and the bodies, either decayed to the point of being skeletons or still somewhat intact, were either piled up inside metal cages, still strapped to heinous torture devices or hanging from the ceiling by chains forcefully stabbed through their hands.

And the _smell_. The smell of rotting corpses was unbearable. She was used to the smells of the capital's torture chamber, the smell of flesh and blood...but rotting and decomposing bodies was on an entirely different level. She almost wanted to throw up, something that she had never felt before.

"This estate was formerly owned by the family whose daughter I killed. The reason why they were targeted by Night Raid was because they lured outsiders into their home with fake hospitality then brutally tortured them in this very building." explained Tatsumi with a heavy scowl before he pointed to something at Esdeath's feet.

She looked down and stared straight at the corpse of a young teenager with black hair and a white headband.

"That was my friend Ieyasu. And that girl hanging there?" said Tatsumi sourly, Esdeath's gaze rising up to another teenager hanging from the ceiling. "She was my other friend Sayo. You remember them, right?"

"Y-Yes." replied Esdeath with a nod. She was unable to turn away from the horrible scene before her, something about it causing her to feel uneasy.

"Do you know what links them all together? They were all good, innocent people tortured to death because they weren't from the capital. Outsiders." said Tatsumi as Esdeath turned to face him after finally managing to pull herself away from the corpses.

"It's just like those people you were about to torture, and the countless others sent down into that hellhole before them. They were innocent people just living their lives, but if they disagreed or stepped out of line they were sent there by Honest. You know why? Because he _can_."

Esdeath bit her lip as Tatsumi turned his back on her again and crossed his arms. What he said next caused her more pain then any amount of torture could ever do.

"I'm sorry, but I can't love someone who finds joy in torturing people wrongfully sentenced by a corrupted politician."

Esdeath felt her heart ache and cry, her eyes swimming with sorrow as she looked at him in despair. They were merely words, but to her they were a metal spike driven through her heart and twisted around so viciously it ripped it to shreds. "I...I…"

"You need to make a choice, Esdeath. We can either leave this place together...or separated. It's up to you." stated Tatsumi coldly, the own pain in his heart nearly emerging at the end of his sentence.

Saying what he did had caused him great discomfort because he well and truly did love her, but his feelings about torture and what's right and wrong had prevailed. This was the only viable course of action he saw fit to take, and what happened in the next minute or so would determine the next thing he would do.

Esdeath looked down at the grass beneath her feet and held her hands up to her chest, a furious debate currently take place within her very soul.

It was going to be either one or the other, her feelings towards both subjects fighting each other in a grueling death battle where only one would be crowned victor. Torture had been something she had done her entire life ever since she first joined the Imperial Army, and Tatsumi was the only person in the world she considered to be the love of her life, and that she would never be able to find someone else.

After a few more seconds of silence, she closed her eyes and let out a deep breath. She had her answer.

Tatsumi was standing a few feet away, his gaze up at the clear blue sky above, when all of a sudden a pair of arms wrapped themselves gently around his neck and hugged him. Esdeath rested her chin on his shoulder and squeezed a little, a slight shudder reverberating through her body and into his.

"I choose you. I...I don't want to be left alone again...you're the only man for me." she said in almost a whisper.

"Are you sure?" asked Tatsumi as Esdeath let go of him so he could turn around and look at her directly.

"Yes, I am." she said, Tatsumi glaring at her for a few more seconds before he finally smiled again and embraced her.

"Okay. I believe you."

After standing there for a few minutes, he took her back to the Reconditioning Department building and waited outside while she went back inside to, as she put it, "make it right".

It took a while, but eventually she emerged from within and behind her, to Tatsumi's shock and with tears of joy on their faces, were the seven people "accused" of conspiring with the Revolutionary Army. They still showed signs of some torture, but the fact of the matter was that they were still *alive. After they left Esdeath walked over to Tatsumi and he wrapped an arm around her, the General sighing heavily.

"I'm beside myself right now...You, of all people, were actually able to accomplish a feat such as this." she said, Tatsumi chuckling in slight amusement at her disbelief.

"That's just who I am. I told you not to underestimate me, Esdeath. And about what you did for those people, I appreciate you doing that for me, no...for us." said Tatsumi as he rubbed her shoulder, Esdeath smiling and shaking her head. "Really, I mean it."

"Once we get back to the mansion, we'll settle this behind closed doors." she said with a mischievous grin, Tatsumi raising an eyebrow.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Oh you _know_ what I mean."

 **\- Main Gate -**

 **\- Several Hours Later -**

As the sun began to set over the horizon, a certain individual with reddish pink hair and butterfly headphones approached the main gate leading into the capital with cosmetics case in her hand and a backpack thrown over her shoulders. She took out a lollipop and inserted it into her mouth before she placed the case into her backpack and closed it, her eyes resting on the sprawling city before her.

" _I'm coming for you Tatsumi. I'll try to find you as soon as I can!_ "


	5. Adaptive Tyranny

A/N I'm surprised that I've managed to have all of these chapters be above 3,500k words, considering a trend of mine in some of my stories is that the first few chapters always seem to be the shortest. Not with this one though, I've found it to be surprisingly easy. Leave a fav and review telling me what you all think so far.

* * *

 **Chapter 4 - Adaptive Tyranny**

Chelsea, disguised as a man in his forties with greying hair, casually walked the streets of the capital with her hands in the pockets of her disguise and her eyes constantly on the move all around her. She hadn't found Tatsumi the day before, so instead of continuing on into the night she had managed to check into an inn and stay the night there.

" _Damn, this place is huge. Finding Tatsumi is gonna be more difficult then I thought._ " she thought with a slight frown as she turned a corner onto another street.

Unfortunately, she also ended up running right into a man with navy blue hair walking beside a younger girl dressed up like she was in the navy. "Oh, my bad."

"It's fine, we should've been paying more attention." replied the man as he stepped aside to allow Chelsea by, the little girl staring at her with an aloof expression.

"Thank you." she replied before walking by the two and continuing on her way, the man and girl doing the same.

"Come on Wave, you should watch where you're going from now on." stated the girl, Chelsea halting in her tracks when the name struck a memory chord in her brain.

" _Wave? That's one of the Jaegers! And that girl...I think that might be Akame's little sister, Kurome._ " she thought as she glanced over her shoulder and watched the two Jaegers turn down the road she just came from. " _And if I'm right, they should be able to lead me to their headquarters._ "

Ducking down another alleyway, she quickly morphed into a small bird and took to the skies so that she could keep an eye on the two Jaegers from above and not risk being discovered on the way there. When she spotted Wave's hair again she chirped and began to fly overtop of them, adding in some erratic movements this way and that so she didn't seem too out of sorts.

" _Hold on Tatsumi. I'm on my way._ "

It didn't take long thankfully for the Jaegers to arrive at a massive mansion that Chelsea guessed acted as their base of operations, and so now that she was there she diverted her attention on finding a way in.

She spotted an open window on the first floor and flew towards it, touching down on the sill and folding her wings back as she looked around inside.

All of a sudden a man with blonde hair appeared before her and she chirped out of shock. He looked down at her and smiled softly as he reached underneath her beak and stroked the feathers there with the tip of his index finger.

"Hello there." he said, Chelsea deciding to along with the act and allowing him to continue. "I wonder where you came from?"

" _You wouldn't want to know, guy._ " thought Chelsea after the man stopped stroking her feathers.

"Hey Run, we're back!" she heard Wave yell from somewhere inside the mansion, Chelsea determining the blonde haired man was Run when he turned around.

"I'll be there in a moment!" he called out over his shoulder.

He bid farewell to Chelsea with a small wave before walking away, leaving her alone on the window sill with a greater understanding of who the Jaegers actually were like.

" _To be honest, they seem a lot like us._ " she thought before, after Run finally left the room, she dropped down onto the floor and morphed into a tiny spider with a small puff of smoke.

She scurried over to one of the walls of the room, which turned out to be a library, and ascended its face near the door, thinking to herself, " _I'm going to have a lot of ground to cover...shit._ "

 **\- Imperial Capital Outskirts -**

Unfortunately for Chelsea, Tatsumi wasn't even at the mansion. He wasn't even in the capital city at all. He was currently in the outskirts surrounding the city walls with Esdeath, the two enjoying themselves by engaging in one of her favorite pastimes, hunting down and killing Danger Beasts.

"Now I see why you like doing this as a hobby!" he exclaimed as he cut a reptilian danger beast in half at the waist, Esdeath grinning as she stabbed another with her rapier through the brain.

"If only they were stronger, then this would be a whole lot more interesting!" she replied before the last Danger Beast was finished off by Tatsumi.

There had been at least twenty to attack them, and in the aftermath there were at least twenty corpses now littering the ground, their blades stained red with their blood.

As Esdeath was returning her blade back into its sheath she heard something that she couldn't quite understand. She glanced at Tatsumi and he had the very same look of confusion plastered on his face, which meant that he heard it as well. They both knew what the sound was, they heard it all the time, but out in the forest?

"Is that...clapping?" he asked, the two looking at one another for a moment before they tensed up and heightened their senses.

It was indeed the sound of clapping their eardrums were registering, and as it got closer and closer it seemed to be coming from the trees all around them, not just from one particular area.

"Show yourself, or I'll force you to come out!" shouted Esdeath while she pointed her rapier at the surrounding forest, Tatsumi doing the same with Incursio's key.

"Ah...I knew it was you, General Esdeath. And that other person...a friend, I assume?" asked a voice from the trees, Tatsumi narrowing his eyes.

From the treeline to their left emerged a figure dressed in grey baggy pants, boots, a white and red hoodie over a plain white t-shirt, and a facemask that covered up his face up to the bridge of his nose. Three black studs were pierced into his left ear and hanging around his neck was a necklace, a metal cross.

He had spiky white hair with two tufts reminiscent of horns and a single bang that covered the left side of his face. His one visible eye was a piercing red with a slit pupil and black sclera, giving him the appearance of a demon.

"Who are you? You must have some grade of military or sword training considering that weapon of yours." stated Tatsumi as he motioned to the blood red rapier hanging from the man's belt.

"Of course, where are my manners? My name is Solomon Glass, and I'm merely a drifter whose travelled all across the Empire. And I'm more of a self-taught swordsman, to answer your question." said the man with courteous bow. "And I care not for the war going on between the Empire and the Revolutionary Army, either."

"Then why approach us?" asked Esdeath suspiciously, Solomon chuckling.

"It's a simple matter really…" he said before, in a flash, his hand flew to the handle of his sword and drew it out, the tip pointed right at her.

"My one true passion and desire is to fight the strongest of opponents, whether they be human or Danger Beast. And who better an opponent then the Empire's Strongest General herself?"

Tatsumi tightened his grip around Incursio and was about to summon the armor before Esdeath stepped forward with her arm outstretched, a grin on her face.

"If he desires to fight me, I'll gladly grant him his wish." she said, Tatsumi looking at her for a few seconds before he nodded.

"Okay, be careful." he said, Esdeath turning her head and smiling at him before returning her attention to Solomon.

He had now gotten into a proper fighting stance with his left arm held behind his back and his right foot a few steps in front of his left. It reminded her of a fencer's stance, considering his body's position, but she didn't really care.

"Since you challenged me, I'll give you the pleasure of determining if we use Teigu or not, if you have one at all." stated Esdeath as she raised up her own rapier, Solomon chuckling again while Tatsumi walked to the edge of the small clearing so he could watch and be ready to interject at any moment.

"Don't worry, I do. And it wouldn't be interesting if we didn't use them!" Solomon replied back, Esdeath's grin widening out of pure excitement.

"Very well, you better be ready because I won't hold back!" she exclaimed before several large icicles formed in the air around her, their tips sharpened to a lethal point.

She threw her arm forward and the icicles were launched at Solomon like bullets, the drifter blinking once before, like a dancer, he side-stepped and slashed his way through the oncoming swarm without a single wasted movement. After the last icicle was cut to pieces, he locked his gaze with Esdeath and smirked under his facemask.

"My turn. Ignem Alienum."

He snapped his fingers on his free hand and from the air itself, soccerball sized fireballs manifested around him like the planets in the solar system and were instantly fired at Esdeath. The General, instead of playing defensive, sprinted right at him while dodging each and every projectile easily.

"So your Teigu enables you to create fire out of nothing? Wonderful!" she said excitedly as she swung at Solomon's gut, the drifter parrying the attack and throwing a kick at her neck.

He was caught off guard when Esdeath merely raised her free hand and blocked the strike easily, her fingers gripping the bottom of his boot tightly for a matter of seconds before his entire leg from the knee down was encased in ice.

She leaped back when he swung at her with his own blade and clumsily stumbled due to his frozen limb, Solomon grunting slightly after he regained his balance. To her surprise, however, he remained perfectly calm and slowly shook his head.

"This won't stop me, General. I still have plenty of tricks up my sleeve. Ignis Pellem." he said calmly, Esdeath's eyes widening when his entire body burst into flames and easily melted the ice.

When his leg was finally free the fire dissipated and he stood before her once again without a single scratch or burn mark on him, Esdeath's grin dropping when he took his stance once again and said, "Your ice has no effect on me. I'll just melt my way out of it."

" _So he can willingly create fire around himself...freezing him in ice is out of the question then. He also seems to be skilled with the blade as well. But…_ " she thought as she devised a new strategy in her mind and set out the steps to follow that would ensure her a quick victory. " _I'll show him why challenging me was a grave mistake._ "

Solomon, without warning, suddenly rushed her again with his rapier at his side. They exchanged several quick but furious blows that echoed throughout the forest, Esdeath easily showing her dominance in combat by avoiding many of Solomon's stabs and swings while also adding in a few of her own that managed to get by his defense and create cuts in his hoodie deep enough to draw blood.

"You are indeed a skilled fighter, but this is why they call me the Empire's Strongest General!" exclaimed Esdeath with a malicious smile before she dropped to one knee and slashed through Solomon's right knee cap, severely crippling him.

He sucked up the pain however and continued to fight while putting all of his weight on his other leg, impressing Esdeath with his tenacity. Still, however, she continued to hammer away at him until finally she pushed him into a corner and with the flick of her wrist she created two large icicles behind Solomon and sent them flying through his abdomen, causing him to cough out blood and lower his guard.

" _It's over._ " thought Tatsumi when Esdeath reared back and sliced right through his right arm, severing the limb from his body and disarming him of his blade.

"Fuck…" cursed Solomon with a heavy breath as he dropped to one knee and let out several raspy breaths, the icicles impaled through his gut causing him great discomfort with every breath he took.

"You definitely surprised me with your skills, but it was foolish of you to challenge someone like me. Get stronger, and maybe we can fight again someday." stated Esdeath with a grin before she turned her back on Solomon and began to walk towards Tatsumi.

She stopped suddenly when she felt a dark aura emerge from behind, her head turning slowly around until she looked at Solomon with an intrigued expression. He was definitely hurt, but his power seemed to be _growing_.

"I didn't think I would have to use it...but I have no other choice." said Solomon as he slowly picked himself up off the ground and wobbled a bit, Esdeath glancing down at his severed arm and watching in shock when it turned to ash.

"My Teigu...it's name is Demonic Phoenix God's Will: Vile Blood Curse, and it doesn't just allow me to manifest fire…" he said as he raised his head up and glared at Esdeath, the icicles protruding out of his back and stomach suddenly melting away.

Both Esdeath and Tatsumi were baffled when the holes in his chest slowly regenerated themselves and fully healed, leaving brand new skin in its place while steam rolled off his skin as a result. What followed next was his slashed knee, the skin and shattered bone reconnecting themselves. Finally, the greatest shock of them all, the bloody stump that used to be his right arm bulged out and slowly regenerated, bone, muscles and all, until he had two arms once again.

"I can regenerate any part of my body and can survive any fatal wound, even decapitation. That is one of my Trump Cards." started Solomon as he slowly shed his hoodie and T-shirt, revealing his bare chest and back.

He hunched down and growled loudly, the skin on his back beginning to bulge out and contort before finally several tears appeared in the skin and to their horror, several monumental tentacles made of pure blood shot out of his back and began to swirl and write all over the place, their tips forming into either sword blades or axe heads.

"The other is that I can turn my own blood into weapons, giving me an inexhaustible arsenal. I can never stop fighting, General. I can never die. Just like a phoenix, I can be reborn from the ashes!" announced Solomon as he reached down and picked up his rapier once again, Esdeath clenching her jaw muscles and glaring at her enemy .

"You say you are the Empire's Strongest General, correct? Prove it! Let's see if you can kill something that's unkillable!" shouted Solomon before he charged Esdeath, the blood tentacles protruding from his back attacking her from all sides with their blade-tipped ends.

She blocked and parried every strike with either her rapier or a wall of ice, and that alone was enough to astonish Tatsumi since she did it so flawlessly, like it was second habit. But what surprised him even more was that she was *smiling the entire time. She was obviously enjoying herself.

"The thrill of battle...this is what I live for! I accept your challenge!" she bellowed gleefully when she backflipped to avoid a downward slash from an axe-headed tentacle.

Esdeath landed on both feet and slapped her palm onto the ground, shouting, "Grauhorn!"

A couple of feet in front of her a massive pillar of ice with a sharpened tip sprung out of the ground, shooting straight up at Solomon's gut. His reflexes allowed him to protect himself, but the ice pillar continued on its course and shot straight up, taking him along with it hundreds of feet into the air.

Esdeath gave chase by sprinting up the ice and once it stopped growing and, upon getting close enough, she catapulted herself into the air right at him. She created two individual hunks of ice on either side of him and criss-crossed her arms, the movement causing several spikes to appear from the ice that extended out like a spiderweb and impaled Solomon from other side in his arms and legs.

He only had a split second to look up and see her smirk before she spun once in the air and delivered a devastating kick with her heel onto the top of his head. The force alone was enough to shatter his spine and send him rocketing back down to Earth and smash into the ground, creating a fairly large crater around his body. Luckily his Teigu enabled him to recover quickly and he got back up, Esdeath noticing this and getting even more excited.

"Hagelsprung." she said as she snapped her fingers and created a massive pillar of ice in the air behind her, its target none other then Solomon.

He saw the attack coming and drastically increased the size of his blood tentacles before sending them skyward to slow the descent of the hunk of ice.

"He's resilient, I'll give him that." thought Esdeath before she landed on the back of the ice and pressed her hand up against it.

Another horn of ice formed on the other side and flew straight for Solomon at break-neck speed, and being unable to dodge it in time the ice impaled him through the gut with its tip and caused him to hack out more blood and lose focus on holding back the ice block above.

That momentary lapse of concentration was all that Esdeath needed to create a second ice pillar and smash it into the first, completely overpowering Solomon's strength.

"Shit." was all he had time to say before the two monumentally sized ice blocks crashed down onto him, the impact creating an even bigger crater and a plume of dirt that flew out in all directions.

" _So this is the power of the Empire's strongest...amazing._ " thought Tatsumi in awe while Esdeath landed on the ground and observed her handiwork with a smile.

She knew, however, if that was he said was true, then Solomon would probably still be alive underneath the ice and that he would emerge at any moment.

" _Since you've entertained me so much, I might just show you my Trump Card._ " she thought when, like she suspected, Solomon broke apart the ice weighing him down and managed to pull himself up, his wounds, both internal and external, healing themselves in a matter of seconds.

"That was wonderfully executed General." he said while he popped his neck. "But I'm not through yet. In fact, I'm just getting started! Immortalis Aestuo!"

He pulled down his face mask and reared back as he sucked in an enormous amount of air, his cheeks puffing up as a result. When the pressure built up to its limit he threw his head forward and exhaled a massive wave of fire that raced towards Esdeath, the flames incinerating everything and anything in its path.

While Esdeath avoided the attack by launching herself into the air with the assistance of an ice column, she was deep in thought concerning Solomon's abilities and just what exactly his Teigu was.

" _After seeing everything he's managed to do up until now, and considering that he can utilize his own blood as a weapon, I can assume that the Teigu itself is his blood, like mine. And if he can regenerate injuries, limbs and blood because of it…_ "

Instantly the answer to her problem popped into her head and she smiled, her eyes locking onto Solomon. " _My victory is assured._ "

Solomon sent out his blood tentacles again while she was still in the air, Esdeath twisting and turning to avoid some while she used her rapier to cut through and that got too close.

"You've fought valiantly my friend…" she started as she touched down on the scorched grass below after the fire he created had died down and watched as Solomon's blood tentacles converged in on her, his intention to take her out of the fight quite clear.

"But this is the end. All will freeze before me." stated Esdeath as she held up her hand to the tattoo on her chest, a dark blue orb appearing over it. "Mahapadma."

The orb rapidly expanded, encompassing everything around her, and in its wake all of space and time were frozen, the world appearing to be a shade of dull blue. Esdeath glanced around at the tentacles locked in space around her, then over at Tatsumi who was looking at where she was over at the opposite end of the clearing.

He was smiling, and she felt warm inside for a few moments before she returned her attention to her opponent. Solomon was standing a few yards before her with his right arm outstretched and his rapier at his side. The perfect opportunity.

"I commend you on making me use my Trump Card...normally I shouldn't have to, but this situation calls for it." she said as she casually walked up to Solomon and stared at him, her hand's grip on her sword tightening.

She stabbed the sword through his chest, the blade emerging out of his back. Not even a second later space and time unfroze and the technique deactivated, Solomon returning to life and gasping when blood spurted out of his chest and his tentacles smashed into the ground on nothing.

"W-What?!" he sputtered when he saw Esdeath standing right in front of him with her sword stabbed through his chest.

He tried to move but found out quickly that he was paralyzed, the look of shock on his face making Esdeath's grin grow bigger.

"You indeed are a strong fighter, but you still have a weakness that can be exploited. For one, since you can heal injuries, I deduced that if I stabbed you and kept the weapon in you, your Teigu can't heal around it. And to keep you immobilized I stabbed you through the portion of your spine that enables movement, so you're effectively paralyzed until I remove my sword." said Esdeath, Solomon growling at her out of frustration at the truth in her words.

"Secondly, since your Teigu enables you to regenerate lost limbs and blood, then the only way to truly kill you is if I totally destroy your body and leave nothing remaining, not even the tiniest drop of blood. That's the one way you _can_ die, right?"

Solomon glared at Esdeath for a few more seconds before his expression softened and he chuckled, saying, "You're the only person to ever discover my weakness. I concede."

"Very well." said Esdeath as she withdrew her blade and sheathed it, allowing Solomon to heal himself and absorb his blood back into his body.

Tatsumi, seeing that the fight was now over, walked over to them and stood next to Esdeath with his hands in his pockets and Incursio's key within the sheath on his back. Upon seeing him again Solomon sighed and ran a hand through his hair out of regret.

"I'm sorry, but I don't think I got to learn your name. What is it?"

"My name's Tatsumi." he replied, Solomon nodding once and apologizing again before he looked back at Esdeath and placed his hands on his hips.

"By the way, what was that technique you just did? How did you manage to get so close to me in such a short span of time?" he asked, Esdeath raising an eyebrow before she smirked and crossed her arms.

"It's my Trump Card, Mahapadma. It freezes time and space for a short while and I can move freely during its activation." she stated before she blushed slightly and glanced at Tatsumi. "But...it's original purpose was so that you couldn't get away from me again, Tatsumi."

Solomon's grin was replaced by confusion as he looked from one person to the other, Tatsumi rubbing the back of his head and grinning sheepishly while Esdeath continued to blush. Finally it dawned on him and he laughed a little because of it.

"I guess I assumed wrong when I said you two were friends, huh?" he asked of them, Tatsumi nodding.

"What will you do now?"

"I dunno. I don't really have a home considering I just go from place to place on a whim." replied Solomon with a sigh before Esdeath held her hand out to him.

"Join the Jaegers."

"The what?" asked Solomon.

"The Jaegers. We're a special police force in service to the Empire that works to maintain order and peace within the capital and take care of anything that threatens its security and general well being." explained Esdeath. "We recently lost one of our members, and you would be a perfect replacement for him due to your strength. Interested?"

Solomon scratched his chin and thought about the offer for a few seconds, the prospect of joining a force no doubt staffed with people like Esdeath, Teigu users, tempting to him, but then at the same time he quite enjoyed not being apart of any faction or war and the freedom he got out of just going where he desired. After a few seconds of silent thought he shrugged and shook Esdeath's outstretched hand.

"Sure, why not? Could be fun."

Tatsumi shared a handshake with the newly christened Jaeger before Solomon retrieved his trashed hoodie and slipped on his miraculously intact T-shirt. They travelled back to the capital while sharing some small talk, Solomon telling them of some of the battles he's had with Super-class Danger Beasts, and eventually arrived back at the Jaegers HQ where they were greeted by Wave, Bols and Seyru at the front door.

"Everyone, I'd like to introduce to you our newest member, Solomon Glass." said Esdeath with a grin, the Jaegers taking in Solomon's appearance and silently judging him to see if he was up to par.

"Hi." he said with a small wave before he felt something warm up against his leg and looked down, seeing that the source was Koro sniffing him intensely.

"I think Koro likes you!" said Seryu happily when the dog saluted her and walked back towards her on its hind legs, Solomon smiling at its cute appearance.

Tatsumi tapped him on the shoulder and whispered into his ear the truth behind the dog and what it could actually do and Solomon grimaced underneath his facemask, his stomach flipping upside down in disgust when Seryu affectionately hugged the dog after it leaped up into her arms.

"It's a pleasure to meet you Solomon, my name is Bols, and that was Seryu." said Bols as he stepped forward and shook his hand, Wave walking around him and clapping a hand on his shoulder.

"And I'm Wave. Welcome to the club! Run and Kurome are inside and I think they'll take a liking to you."

As they walked back inside, with Seryu asking him of his Teigu and its abilities, Tatsumi and Esdeath remained behind for a few moments and talked about something that made her smile and him laugh. It didn't matter what was said, it was the fact that they were so casual and friendly with one another that greatly shocked the bird watching from afar.

" _No...Tatsumi...how could you?_ " thought Chelsea in overwhelming sadness as they walked into the mansion hand in hand.

Out of all the possibilities told to her by Najenda, it had to be the last one. Tatsumi was indeed alive and he hadn't been captured. He even still had Incursio with him. But instead of returning back to Night Raid, he had went on and joined the Jaegers, their sworn enemy.

There was only one course of action now.

" _I'm sorry Tatsumi...I really am. But you're not gonna live to see tomorrow._ "

Fifteen minutes passed and Tatsumi was taking a stroll outside on the training field to get some fresh air, Esdeath back inside the mansion with the other Jaegers, when he felt something off about the air around him. He got a slight chill up his spine and he heard some trees rustle in the distance.

He squinted to see through the leaves and he saw a bird staring right back at him with somewhat of an evil glint in its eyes, but yet at the same time the animal appeared to be...regretful? He looked at it for a few more seconds before he noticed a strange pattern of feathers on its chest, something that to him seemed odd at first before he thought about it more and realized just what it was.

" _So...the time has come, huh?_ " he thought as he placed his hands in his pockets and locked gazes with the bird.

"Chelsea, I know its you." he said aloud, the bird visibly stiffening up at the mentioning of the name.

" _Shit, he could tell? That complicates things._ " she thought before she flew out of the tree and touched down on the soft dirt, a plume of smoke emerging around her.

Tatsumi kept a straight face on as Chelsea emerged from the smoke cloud with her Teigu, Gaea Foundation, hanging from her right hand and a lollipop in her mouth. She was scowling heavily at him, no doubt her anger at his betrayal spurring her emotions more so then any other.

"Chelsea-"

"How could you?" she asked, Tatsumi taken aback at the tone in her voice. "How could you betray us like that and join the Jaegers?"

"I can explain that-"

"They're our enemy!" she shouted, being nearly on the verge of tears while Tatsumi quickly looked around and held his hands up to try and calm her down.

"Quiet! Someone might hear you!" he said, Chelsea glaring at him out of anger and sadness.

Unfortunately for him, someone did indeed hear Chelsea's voice and to his horror it was the last person he wanted to see. Auburn hair. Metallic prosthetic arms. And then there was that dog.

"Tatsumi? Who's that your talking to?" asked Seryu as she and Koro approached him from the direction of the mansion, her eyes widening when she saw Chelsea standing a few feet away from him with Gaea Foundation in her grasp.

She immediately thought back to a report she remembered seeing from some friends in the Imperial Intelligence Agency about Night Raid getting two new members that had been seen helping repel the attack made by Dr. Stylish and his forces.

One of them had been a tall man with a white coat with ferocious attack strength, and the other had been someone who appeared to be carrying a strange looking case around with her, something reminiscent of a cosmetics case. She put two and two together and something snapped inside her head, the feeling only getting worse when Koro began to growl and snarl, his usually hidden mouth parting to reveal his sharpened teeth.

"You...You're one of them…" she said in a low tone, Tatsumi starting to sweat a little the more Koro growled.

"Seryu, I have no idea what you're talking about." he said, Seryu eyeing him now with a vicious glare that could've burned holes though him.

"Koro! Number 3!" she shouted, Koro growing larger and clamping its jaws around her right arm, Tatsumi and Chelsea both cringing as the dog pulled itself off a massive sword that had taken the place of her arm.

She pointed the large blade at him and grinned madly, Tatsumi's heart beginning to beat out of his chest. "You're tainted with evil, and it is my duty to enact justice on you and purge your existence!"

"Seryu stop! Let me explain!" yelled Tatsumi, but his plea fell on deaf ears when she ran at him full speed and swung her sword down at him.

He quickly activated Incursio and blocked the blade with Neuntote, the force of the blow causing him to grunt. Moments later red lightning lanced across his chest and he grunted again only this time from the same pain he felt from his fight with Wave.

"Chelsea, leave! Before it's too late!" he yelled through clenched teeth, Chelsea unsure of what was happening.

A Jaeger attacking one of their own? And why is Tatsumi, a traitor to Night Raid, defending her if he really had joined the enemy?

"Chelsea, look out!"

She gasped when Tatsumi chucked Neuntote like a javelin right over her shoulder and into Koro, who had managed to sneak up behind her and was about to eat her whole. The force of the spear striking the dog-like Teigu in the face sent it flying backward into a group of trees, Tatsumi quickly turning around to face Seryu again without his spear.

"What the hell is going on?!" shouted Wave as he sprinted out onto the training field with the rest of the Jaegers, Esdeath stepping past him and looking at both Tatsumi and Seyru with wide eyes.

"If you all would give me time to explain, I would!" yelled back Tatsumi before he collapsed to his knees and grunted again, the pain beginning to feel unbearable inside the armor.

Solomon spotted Chelsea standing in the background, rooted to the ground, and he quickly leaped over to her side when Koro finally got back up and attempted to attack her again. He grabbed the spear still imbedded in its head and whipped it back around, throwing the Teigu back over to where Seryu was while freeing Neuntote from its flesh at the same time.

"Seryu, explain your actions." ordered Run sternly, the girl glaring at him before she grinned again and pointed right at Chelsea.

"That girl, she's a member of Night Raid. Tatsumi was never one of us, he was making it up!" she announced, all of the Jaegers gasping and turning to look at him.

Tatsumi glanced over at them and felt his heart ache at he shocked expression painted on Esdeath's face, no doubt her own heart feeling the same way at the possible reality of what Seryu said being true. He reached up and gripped the underside of the armor's helmet, pulling upward with all his might until he was able to rip off the helmet and show her his face.

"Esdeath...believe me when I say this...I am _not_ a member of Night Raid." he said as he mustered up the strength to stand up once again, Esdeath silently watching him with a face that told him 'don't you dare lie to me'. "My feelings are absolute, I know where I belong. Esdeath, I love you from the bottom of my heart. There's nothing that could ever change that."

Before anything else could be said, Seryu ripped her arm out of Koro's mouth, now wielding the long-range anti-tank rifle she dubbed "Number 7: Taizan's Cannon of Justice". With a malicious smile on her face she aimed the gun right at Tatsumi and fired, a high-velocity shell rocketing right at him and exploding in a violent fireball upon striking his gut.

The smoke drifted away and Tatsumi was revealed to still be alive, albeit seriously injured with some of Incursio's armor blown away as a result of the explosion and blood dripping from his lips. He held one hand over his gut, no doubt trying to put pressure on the multitude of broken ribs he now possessed thanks to the shell.

"Esdeath, believe me! I would never lie to you!" he yelled out before coughing out blood, red lightning from Incursio coursing over his body and inflicting even more pain on him.

"This is my justice! Die!" yelled Seryu maniacally before she fired another shell, Tatsumi closing his eyes and holding up his other hand so as to not see it coming.

A few seconds passed and the explosion didn't come, Tatsumi slowly opening his eyes and discovering that the shell had been frozen in mid air within a block of ice, and that standing before him was Esdeath. Without saying a word she dropped to one knee and threw her arms around him, lightly hugging him.

"I know." she whispered into his ear, Tatsumi letting out a sigh of relief while she helped him up to his feet and motioned for Solomon to toss Neuntote over to her.

"Captain…?" asked Seryu in confusion as Esdeath drew her rapier and stood side by side with Tatsumi after handing him back his spear.

"Seryu Ubiquitous, you've been a wonderful member of the Jaegers and a valued subordinate, but...you need help. You're not thinking straight. Please, for your sake, surrender." she said out of concern, part of her still believing that she was a friend while another part told her that she was too dangerous to be around.

Seryu stared at the one person she looked up to after the deaths of her mentor and friend, Ogre and Dr. Stylish respectfully, her heart shattering to pieces. After a few moments of silence something snapped in her head and she cocked her head to the side, her eyes growing wide with insanity while she brought up the cannon again and aimed it right at her.

"You've been tainted too, Captain. You need to be killed." she said, Koro roaring as he charged them with his gaping maw wide open.

Esdeath ducked to the ground and planted her hand on the dirt, three separate ice pillars shooting out of the ground at once and impaling Koro from the left, right and middle, effectively blinding him and keeping him in one spot. Tatsumi took the opportunity and leaped over Esdeath, holding Neuntote back and going right for the Teigu with the intent to not only remove it as a threat but also avenge the death of Sheele since the dog had eaten her corpse.

" _This is for you, Sheele._ " he thought with a small smile as he swung with all his might and cut clean through Koro, splitting him into two even halves.

"Koro!" yelled Seryu at the defeat of her Teigu, and when she saw that he wasn't regenerating like he normally does since he was a biological-type, she figured out that his core must've been destroyed.

"I'll kill you!" she shrieked as she held up the cannon and fired round after round at Tatsumi, the speed granted to him by Incursio enabling him to avoid each shell and its subsequent explosion.

Within seconds he was right on top of her and with his spear he cleaved off both of her arms, kicked her square in the gut to knock her to the ground, and half out of fury and half out of revenge, he sweeped the blade through her midsection and bifurcated her, splattering blood this way and that as a result.

He stood over her, glaring down at her with rage swimming in his eyes while gripping the bloodied handle of Neutnote. She tried to shoot him with the gun implanted into the back of her mouth, but he easily dodged it, leaving her without any options and at his complete mercy.

"It's over...Seryu…" he said through heavy breaths, the girl staring him down before her scowl morphed into an insane smile, her mind and sense obviously now completly gone with the wind.

"Final Number: Chakravartin Furnace of Five Hells." she said before she clacked her teeth together, a tiny click resonating out from behind them before Tatsumi heard the sound of faint beeping coming from her head.

"What did you do?" he asked, Seryu beginning to laugh at the top of her lungs, the Jaegers and Chelsea looking on in utter silence at how far gone the girl was.

"You can say this is the Trump Card of the Judgement of the Ten Heavenly Kings." she stated with a giggle, the ticking in her head beginning to speed up. "As my final act of justice, I'll annihilate all you from the face of this world!"

The ticking got quicker and quicker, and Tatsumi assumed that as a last resort, Dr. Stylish had implanted a bomb inside her head that she alone could activate and that it was nearing detonation. Thinking purely on instinct, he twirled Neuntote around so that the bladed end was facing downward and raised it high up into the air with both hands, Seryu continuing to laugh as he did.

He thrust the spear downward, the red blade piercing through her forehead and splitting apart her skull into two halves and instantly killing her. Tatsumi noticed a few sparks fly out from her brain and when he heard no more ticking, he let out a heavy sigh of relief and stepped back from the mad Jaeger's corpse. He turned back around and smiled weakly at Esdeath, who returned the gesture and started to walk towards him after freezing the rest of Koro's body in ice.

Suddenly Tatsumi gasped and he collapsed to his knees, agonizing pain now coursing through his veins. Esdeath sprinted over to him in time to catch him in her arms as he fell over, his eyes half-open and raspy breaths emerging from beyond his lips.

"I'm...sorry…" he whispered before he went unconscious, Incursio's armor, instead of vanishing, remaining active around his body.

As he slowly faded into the black, he could hear the deep, guttural laughter of a monster. " ** _Your mind is shattered, your will broken. You have no idea who friend or foe is anymore. You stupid fool...you're mine now._** "

Esdeath sat there motionless, a hand flying to his neck to check for a pulse and thankfully she could still feel one, albeit it being very weak. She looked up at the Jaegers, unsure of what to do, until her eyes came to rest on Chelsea, who was still standing next to Solomon.

"You." she said, Chelsea stiffening up and a terrified expression appearing on her face. "Come here."

When she didn't move, Solomon lightly prodded her in the back with his hand and she walked forward, the Jaeger taking her up to Esdeath and Tatsumi's comatose body. Esdeath motioned with her eyes and Solomon stepped back, allowing the two to talk alone.

"You know Tatsumi, correct?" she asked, Chelsea nervously nodding.

"Are you a member of Night Raid…?"

Chelsea couldn't stop shaking since she was in the presence of the Ice Queen herself, but when she glanced down at Tatsumi and remembered how he had protected her even though they were technically enemies, she slowly nod her head again.

Esdeath glared at her for a few minutes before she slipped one of Tatsumi's arms over her shoulders and motioned at Chelsea to grab the other. "Then help me bring him inside. I'll decide what to do with you later."

"O-Okay…" stuttered Chelsea as she grasped Tatsumi's arm and pulled him up in tandem with Esdeath.

As they slowly took him back to the mansion, the other Jaegers walked by the corpse of Seryu and paid their final respects since she had been a team member. They didn't show it, but they were utterly confused as to what had just occurred. Seryu had accused Tatsumi of still being a member of Night Raid, but Esdeath believed his statement denying that claim and the two ended up killing Seryu.

They hoped that the entire ordeal would be explained soon enough.

* * *

A/N For those that don't know, here are the translations for the moves that Esdeath and Solomon used during their fight. (Esdeath's are in German, Solomon's are Latin. The only exception is Mahapadma, which refers to one of the cold Narakas, specifically the deepest one, where Its inhabitants are exposed to cold so intense that their flesh, as well as internal organs, crack open, causing them to bleed out; they are healed afterwards and the cycle is repeated endlessly. Yikes.)

Grauhorn - Grey Horn

Hagelsprung - Hail Pounce

Mahapadma

Ignem Alienum - Unholy Fire

Ignis Pellem - Fire Skin

Immortalis Aestuo - Immortal Blaze


	6. Tyrannical Power

A/N Yay the psycho bitch is dead, may the bells ring and the people rejoice! God I hated her, she needed to just chill out. That dog too...that is a big NOPE. That last chapter was exceptionally long, and it was only the 4th one. I have a feeling this story may be in the running to reach the word count of my Naruto fanfiction at over 200k words. Maybe. Also, I have some more of the character pages done on FanficCollective, more specifically the rest of the Jaegers and Night Raid, including Solomon. I've also created the page for his Teigu, Vile Blood Curse, and updated all the other character pages with information pertaining to their age and such. Leave a fav and review

* * *

 **Chapter 5 - Tyrannical Power**

It had been at least ten minutes since Esdeath and Chelsea had taken Tatsumi, still comatose and contained inside Incursio, back into the mansion and had laid him to rest on one of the many couches in the large living room. Chelsea stood awkwardly on one side of the couch with Gaea Foundation resting on a table close by while Esdeath sat in a chair directly facing her with her legs crossed over one another and her hat resting in her lap.

The other Jaegers either sat or stood in other various parts of the room, their eyes darting from one person to the other. The entire room was quiet, the tension in the air near its breaking point. Someone was gonna have to give, and it was only a matter of time before it happened.

Turns out it was Run who spoke first.

"Can someone please explain to me what just happened?" he asked, Esdeath glancing over at him and sighing heavily.

"I guess there's no use in keeping it from you all any longer..." she said, Wave looking over at her and lowering his gaze when he realized what she meant.

"What do you mean, Captain?" asked Kurome.

"There's something about Tatsumi that I kept from all of you, with myself and Wave being the only people who knew. Before becoming a Jaeger, Tatsumi was indeed a member of Night Raid." she said while staring right at Chelsea, all of Jaegers except for Wave staring at her with baffled expressions.

"Seryu's actions however were uncalled for. We all know that she wasn't right in the head, and that if Tatsumi had time to explain the situation to her, she most likely would've understood. There's also one last thing that we have to clear up…"

She pointed at Chelsea and she gulped nervously, all eyes falling on her. "Do you have any idea why Tatsumi ended up passing out from using Incursio?"

Chelsea glanced down at his docile form and thought of when he last used it against Team Stylish, compared it to just a few minutes ago, and came up with an answer based on those differences.

"No, I don't, but normally when he uses Incursio he's fine going off of when I saw him use it last."

"I think I might have the answer, then." stated Wave as he walked over to Tatsumi and kneeled down beside him while placing a hand on his shoulder.

"What do you mean?" asked Bols, Wave glancing back at them with a grim expression on his face.

"If he was able to use it normally before while a part of Night Raid, and now it causes him pain to use it, then there's only one possible reason. Teigu Rejection."

Esdeath raised an eyebrow in curiosity, the term's meaning definitely catching the attention of her and the other Jaegers. Wave pulled out Grand Chariot's key and held it tightly in his other hand, standing up afterwards so that everyone can see the blade.

"There was a Fleet Admiral in the Imperial Navy that applied for a Teigu, and I remember seeing him try to wield it. He and the Teigu didn't match one another, and it rejected him. He ended up dying as a result. The reason why I'm saying this is that due to the fact Tatsumi switched sides from Night Raid to us, the Jaegers, but he still considers them as friends, he's become conflicted as to who are his allies and enemies and because of this indecisiveness, Incursio is rejecting him."

"Well all he would have to do is choose a side and stick with it, right?" asked Solomon, but Wave shook his head as he motioned to Grand Chariot's key.

"Normally yes, but Incursio is special. It was made from the same Super-class Danger Beast as my Grand Chariot, a dragon-type named Tyrant. What makes these Teigu unique is that the flesh of Tyrant still lives on within."

He turned to look at all the Jaegers and placed Grand Chariot on the table before him and the couch Tatsumi was resting on. "And if what I'm seeing is correct, then its not actually Incursio rejecting Tatsumi, but in fact its _Tyrant_ that is rejecting Tatsumi's will and subjugating its own over his."

"So basically Incursio, or Tyrant, is taking over Tatsumi?" asked Bols, Wave nodding.

Esdeath had been silently listening to Wave present his case, and when he finally finished she leaned forward and stared at him with a dead-serious expression on her face.

"Is there nothing we can do?"

"Not at the moment, no. It's all in Tatsumi's hands now. The bad thing about this is he's extremely vulnerable right now since he and Tyrant are battling over control of his body, which means if someone or some _people_ came here to assassinate him…" he glared back at Chelsea. "Then he would be unable to defend himself."

Esdeath nodded before she got up from the chair and briskly walked over to Chelsea, the young girl cowering down before the General. Completely opposite of what she was expecting, Esdeath placed a hand on her shoulder and with a worried expression on her face she asked, "Please, tell me if Night Raid plans on killing him. I need to know."

Chelsea, still astonished at how she hadn't been killed yet, or worse, tortured, gulped before she held her hands behind her back and lowered her gaze.

"Y-Yes. If I didn't respond within a day, they would assume the worst and all come after me and Tatsumi." she replied, Esdeath looking at her for a few moments before she lifted her hand off her shoulder and returned to Tatsumi's side.

Chelsea could tell just from the look on her face that she cared deeply him, and if what he said earlier was true then the feelings were mutual. She started to feel guilty on the inside for starting something that could've easily been resolved, so to try and make it right she gulped slightly and addressed Esdeath directly.

"I-I'm sorry for causing all of this. If there's any way I can help…"

"There's nothing. You can either leave and return to Night Raid or stay. No one's stopping you." replied Esdeath without looking up at her, Chelsea remaining perfectly still before she walked over to an empty seat and sat down.

"We're gonna need to get ready if Night Raid is coming here." stated Run to Bols and Wave, the two nodding as they turned and left the living room, leaving just Kurome and Solomon behind.

She walked over to Chelsea and stared at her with a blank expression for a few seconds before asking, "So you know my older sister?"

"Yes, I do. Are you Akame's little sister?" she replied back, Kurome nodding with a small smile before Solomon decided to walk over.

"Are you going to be joining the Jaegers?" he asked of her, Chelsea lowering her head and closing her eyes in frustration

"I-I don't know." she replied, Kurome and Solomon glancing at each other before they took their leave to go clean up the training field and remove the corpses of Seryu and Koro.

All the while Esdeath sat on her knees at Tatsumi's side, her head resting on his chest.

" _Tatsumi, please come back to me...and when you do, about changing the Empire...I'll have my answer for you._ "

 **\- Tatsumi's Psyche -**

Tatsumi slowly came to and cracked open his eyes, the smell of sulfur in the air burning his nostrils.

"Ugh…" he groaned as he picked himself up and observed his surroundings.

He seemed to be standing in the center of a volcanic plain with three actively erupting volcanoes standing before him at least a couple of miles away, their ash plumes blotting out the sun and covering up the sky. The pungent smell of sulfur was causing his eyes to water and making it extremely difficult to breath when coupled with all of the ash particles dancing around him.

"Where am I…?" he asked to no one in particular as he took a few steps forward.

" **This is your mind...or I should be saying _was_ your mind.** " spoke a deep, gravely voice from seemingly the air itself.

"Who are you? And what are you talking about?" demanded Tatsumi, he voice laughing at his outburst.

" **You pitiful humans are so moronic. Isn't it clearly obvious, Boy?** " the voice boomed, the earth shaking as a result.

Tatsumi looked around frantically for the source of the tremors, eventually his gaze rising up to rest on the central volcano. His body froze up out a sheer terror when a darkened form climbed up from behind the rock formation and stared straight at him with four piercing red eyes. Just from the cross slit pupils alone he could tell what the creature was.

" **I am Tyrant, the King of Beasts, the Bane of Humankind! My skin is stronger then the strongest armors, my teeth are sharper then the sharpest blades! The shock of my tail is a thunderbolt, my wings stronger then a hurricane! Even Death fears me!** " announced the beast with a mighty roar, the volcano he was standing on erupting and sending a plume of fire and ash skyrocketing upwards.

The light from the the raging inferno and glowing lava was enough to illuminate Tyrant's physique, and what Tatsumi saw was something straight out of a nightmare.

He definitely was a dragon just like the legends say, with a dark maroon and black scaly hide, a massive mouth filled with razor sharp teeth, four red eyes and several wicked horns protruding out from his head.

Spikes ran down the length of his long neck and back and ended at his tail, which possessed a blade-like protrusion reminiscent of a trident. Instead of having a normal body structure for dragons, Tyrant possessed the upper-body structure of a human complete with rippling muscles and opposable thumbs on his clawed hands.

The final part of his image was the pair of large wings extending out from the back of each shoulder, the length between their clawed tips easily over at least a hundred and fifty yards. Overall he was massive, Tatsumi now seeing for himself why it had been so difficult for the First Emperor and his suppression forces to capture and subdue the Danger Beast.

He took a few steps back when Tyrant leaped off the volcano and landed with a deafening boom a few yards in front of him, the gale-force winds produced by his wings flapping nearly blowing him away.

" **And to answer your other question, _I'm_ taking control. You've become lost, your views of friend and foe are blurred.** "

"No I have not!" yelled Tatsumi, Tyrant lowering his head down and leveling one of his four eyes with him. It was easily larger then Tatsumi, the man seeing his reflection in the cross slit pupil.

" **Lies! You just killed a member of the Jaegers, your supposed friends!** " he said with a snarl. " **And what will happen when you meet Night Raid? What will you do then?** "

Tatsumi tried to answer, but the conflicting feelings swirling around inside him caused him to choke up on his own words. Tyrant sneered as he withdrew his head and looked down upon Tatsumi, small flickering flames starting to emerge from between his teeth.

" **My former owner, Bulat, knew which side he was on. He was worthy to wield my flesh as his armor. But you, he who lacks resolve, he who doesn't even know who his friends are, you are unworthy of my power!** " roared Tyrant before he spread his jaws wide open and expelled a large stream of fire that would consume Tatsumi.

He managed to throw himself to the side and avoid the flames, but even so the heat alone was enough to make him recoil in pain. He had no time to recover and ducked away again when Tyrant attempted to squish him flat with one of his hands.

" **Die you insolent wretch!** " snarled Tyrant as he blew another stream of fire at Tatsumi.

Unfortunately he was unable to avoid the blaze and was enveloped by the swirling flames, Tatsumi screaming in agony as they burned more of his will away and increased the Danger Beast's control over his body and mind.

When the flames stopped coming, Tatsumi emerged from the smoke on his knees with parts of his clothes burnt away and steam rolling off his bare skin. He was breathing heavily, the exhaustion from dodging Tyrant's attacks hindering him.

" **If you truly are worthy of wielding my flesh, then fight back whelp! Show me your resolve, your tenacity!** " bellowed Tyrant as he whipped his tail around, the scaled portion below the trident-like blade hitting Tatsumi dead square in the chest and launching him to the side.

He skipped a few times across the ground before coming to a halt thirty yards away from Tyrant. The dragon watched him carefully to see if he would try to get up, his cocky sneer still present.

Tatsumi layed there in the piles of ash and volcanic rock, his entire body screaming at him. The blow had broken nearly all of his ribs and he was starting to let out raspy breaths as a result, the pain overwhelming. His body wanted him to give up, to let the Danger Beast win.

He was close to succumbing to his body's wished, his eyes closing and his breathing slowing down ever so slightly, but in that moment a thought entered his mind. It was of the time he had made the promise to Esdeath the day after returning to the Jaegers.

" _Promise me you won't ever leave again._ "

Tatsumi smiled, and the more he thought of not just Esdeath, but the Jaegers too, of Wave and Bols and Run, the more that smile grew in size. Slowly but surely he felt the fire inside him rise in strength, his will to live beginning to come alive once more.

"No...I can't die yet...not now!" he said weakly as he rolled himself over, despite his body's protest.

" **What was that, Boy?** " asked Tyrant, Tatsumi finally managing to rise to his feet and maintain his balance.

He fixed his gaze on the dragon and grinned, a small trickle of blood emerging from the corner of his lip.

"You're the one who's lying, Tyrant. I know who my friends are. I know who the one I love is." he started, Tyrant's eyes widening in shock when Neuntote manifested in Tatsumi's grasp. "The Jaegers are my family, and anyone who threatens their safety, I will not hesitate to strike them down."

Tyrant snorted as he hunkered down and glared at Tatsumi with fire curling around his lips and teeth, his tail swishing back and forth behind him.

" **Prove it then. Show me that your will is superior to mine!** " he roared before charging at him full speed.

Tatsumi let out a ferocious battle cry as he held Neuntote with both hands and took a running start before leaping into the air, intending to meet with Tyrant in the center of the clearing. Whoever won this testament of strength would win control over Tatsumi's body.

 **\- Reality -**

While Tatsumi did battle with Tyrant, an entire day had gone past in the real world and the Jaegers had prepared themselves for the coming of Night Raid.

Chelsea, after being among the Jaegers and seeing the complete other side of Esdeath, the supposed Ice Queen she had heard horror stories about, wasn't sure about which side she wanted to be on anymore.

She hadn't left the living room since coming there, Solomon providing her with a blanket. She had promised Esdeath that she would watch over Tatsumi, since it was the only thing she could do. After staring at him for at least an hour after waking up, she heard footsteps behind her and turned around to see Esdeath walking towards them.

"I appreciate you looking over him." she said as she took her usual spot beside Tatsumi and placed her cap on the table behind her.

"Of course." replied Chelsea, not knowing what else to say.

"You know...I never thought I would be saying that to a member of Night Raid. Normally I would've tortured you by now." stated Esdeath without turning, Chelsea instantly getting a chill up her spine and shivering at the thought.

"But, and I'm still surprised it happened, Tatsumi somehow managed to change that about me." said Esdeath with a small smile, her hand running softly through his hair. "I care about him more then anything in the entire world...I don't want to ever lose him."

After a few seconds of utter silence, Esdeath looked back at Chelsea and said, "Like I said earlier, if you still consider yourself a member of Night Raid, then you don't have to participate in the coming fight. You can leave if you so desire."

"I know, but I owe Tatsumi my life. That's why I can't decide if I should stay or leave. My friends are your enemies, but after being among you all, you seem to be almost exactly the same. I'm gonna need time to think about it." she replied, Esdeath nodding before she stood up and returned her cap to its spot atop her head.

She suddenly felt a presence above them she hadn't felt for a very long time and she closed her eyes. The time had come, Night Raid was here.

"Very well. Once the battle is over, I'll return to hear your answer. I'm also apologizing now ahead of time for what is to come." she said with a blank expression as she walked towards the exit, her rapier in hand.

"Apologize for what?" asked Chelsea.

"For if I end up killing your friends."

 **\- Tatsumi's Psyche -**

The battle for Tatsumi's body had now taken a drastic turn. Both combatants were starting to experience some level of fatigue, with Tatsumi nearing the verge of death while the Danger Beast was just starting to get tired. He had lost all of his clothes except his pants and was breathing heavily, blood soaking his chin as a result of getting pounded repeatedly by Tyrant's hands and tail.

Tyrant on the other hand also had some visible injuries, with one of the horns on his head now severed and laying off on the side and several stab wounds present in the weaker portions of his scaly hide. Still however he mocked Tatsumi and called him weak, his arrogance unfailing.

" **Now we're getting somewhere! After I kill you, your body will serve as an excellent puppet.** " said the dragon with a sneer, Tatsumi growling as he spit out some blood and gripped Neuntote in his right hand.

"I'm not even close to dying yet, you damn dragon!" he shouted at the top of his lungs before he broke into a dead sprint, Tyrant getting caught off guard by how much strength he still possessed.

Tatsumi used this hesitation to his advantage and launched himself into the air, avoiding a slash from Tyrant's left hand when it came and grinning as he dove in and stabbed the spear straight through one of the Danger Beast's eyes, blood gushing out of the wound and covering Tatsumi's arms in it.

Tyrant roared out in agony as he reared up on his hind legs and swiped at Tatsumi, the young man holding on for dear life to Neutnote as he flew back and forth as a result of Tyrant whipping his head around.

" **You damn peasant! You insect!** " he bellowed before he finally caught Tatsumi and batted him away alongside the spear, his wounded eye closing shut while blood continued to pour down his face. " **I'll rip you to shreds!** "

To Tatsumi's shock, Tyrant vanished instantly, becoming totally invisible and blending in with the environment around him.

" _Dammit, I forgot he could turn invisible!_ " thought Tatsumi as he turned around in a circle, his eyes narrowed and his senses heightened to the highest point they could go to try and detect Tyrant.

When he couldn't spot nor sense the dragon, Tatsumi growled to himself and thought of only one possible way to get the dragon close to him. He held his arm out and braced himself, hoping that Tyrant would take the bait.

All of a sudden his arm exploded into blood and he screamed, Tyrant having bit down on his arm and cutting it clean off from the elbow down. He quickly gulped down the pain however and leaped onto the invisible Tyrant once again, this time bracing himself against Neuntote when he stabbed the spear into a weak spot in Tyrant's flesh.

The dragon roared again as he thrashed his head around to try and shake Tatsumi off, but he held fast and waited for Tyrant to reveal himself once again before going after another of the Danger Beast's eyes.

" **Not this time!** " said Tyrant as he whipped his head back and threw Tatsumi high up into the sky, his eyes widening when the dragon opened his maw and waited for him to drop back down.

"Oh shit!" exclaimed Tatsumi as he scrambled to keep himself in the air, but gravity decided against that and dragged him back down to earth where Tyrant reached up and snapped his jaws around him, swallowing Tatsumi and Neuntote whole.

Tyrant grinned as he felt Tatsumi slide down his throat and enter his stomach, his victory now assured. When he was about to return to taking over his former wielder's body, he burped slightly and started to feel something prod the interior of his stomach.

The feeling got worse and worse and he started to grunt and howl in pain before finally the red tip of Neuntote pierced through his skin, the blade getting forcefully dragged down his belly until a wide enough hole was made for Tatsumi to pull himself out.

"Like _hell_ I will be eaten by a dragon!" he exclaimed as he pushed himself out of Tyrant and fell to the ground covered in his stomach juices and blood.

Tyrant meanwhile stumbled back and clutched his cut open gut with one of his hands, the Danger Beast glaring at him with rage in his eyes.

" **Why you…!** " he snarled as he brought his tail around to try and bat aside the weakened Tatsumi, but before his very eyes he spun Neuntote around and sliced right through his tail, severing the trident-like end clean off and causing Tyrant to howl in pain again.

"Admit it, Tyrant...I can't be killed. You can't win against me." stated Tatsumi with a grin as he turned and looked at the dragon, Tyrant growling at him again before he recognized the look on Tatsumi's face.

It was the same as Bulat, just like all those years ago when they had faced each other in combat after he had received Incursio. The same fire in his eyes, the confident expression. The look of a true warrior.

" **You finally found your resolve…** " uttered Tyrant before, to Tatsumi's surprise, his body began to shrink down in size.

" **Very well, Tatsumi, I will concede to you...for now. But as of this moment, my flesh is your armor. Use it to protect the ones you hold close to your heart.** " said Tyrant, Tatsumi nodding as the dragon got smaller and smaller and shed his wings, taking on the form of Incursio once again, albeit with an entirely new look.

And just like Tyrant, the scenery surrounding Tatsumi also changed, turning from a volcanic wasteland to an endlessly rolling grassland, the brightly shining sun hanging above him and Incursio. His injuries were also healed and his clothes appeared once again, his mind now fully under his control once again.

" **I believe it's time for a wakeup call?** " asked Tyrant through Incursio, Tatsumi nodding before he reached his hand out.

"Let's do this."

Incursio nodded and the armor opened up like a blooming flower, Tatsumi stepping into its embrace. The helmet closed around him and his eyes glowed bright red, his pupils morphing into the trademark cross slit seen in Tyrant's.

Outside his psyche, Chelsea had drawn her knees up to her chest and was heavily thinking about what she was going to say to Esdeath later. All of a sudden Tatsumi's body jerked around wildly and a bright red light consumed him, Chelsea jumping out of the chair and stepping back.

Tatsumi stood up from the couch and the light transformed into a raging inferno, and within it Chelsea could barely make out his figure morphing and changing into something new.

"Tatsumi…?" she asked nervously when the fire ceased to exist, the figure now standing before her totally different then the one resting on the couch a few seconds before.

"Chelsea, where is she? Where's Esdeath?" asked Tatsumi with a glare at Chelsea.

"Out front, with the other Jaegers. Night Raid just arrived." she said after figuring out that it was Tatsumi in control and not Tyrant.

"Alright." he replied before a transformed Neuntote with a larger blade at the end appearing in his hand. "I'll be back."


	7. Old Friends, New Enemies

A/N Tyrant is a boastful hardass, but Tatsumi still managed to win out in the end. Just imagine though how painful it would be to have your entire arm bitten off? God that would be horrible.

On another note, I have Tyrant's page done on FanficCollective with his picture of what I think he looks like, so you can go check it out if you want. Leave fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 6 - Old Friends, New Enemies**

Najenda led the air manta over the mansion Chelsea had described as the Jaeger's HQ in her last message and narrowed her eyes. Standing in the front courtyard of the mansion were their archenemies, each member wielding their Teigu.

Esdeath already had her rapier out of its sheath and was staring up at them with a grin on her face.

Leone clenched her fists and growled when she spotted the infamous Ice Queen, the other members of Night Raid assembled on the tame Danger Beast's back tensing up in anticipation of the coming battle.

" _Kurome…_ " thought Akame in sadness when she recognized her little sister among the Jaegers, no doubt the same thought going through her mind.

"You all know the plan, correct?" asked Najenda, everyone nodding. "Then you know what we have to do. Go!"

Esdeath's grin widened when everyone except Najenda lept off the flying manta ray and touched down on the grass a couple of yards away from her, the assassins scowling mainly at her because of her reputation.

"So we finally meet, Night Raid." she said, Akame stepping forward and pointing the unsheathed Murasame at her.

"Tell us what you've done with Tatsumi and Chelsea." she demanded coldly.

Esdeath was about to say something, but all of a sudden the entire mansion shook to its core, both the Jaegers and Night Raid feeling the incredible surge of raw power coming from within the building.

It took her a second, but when she recognized the _feel_ of the power, she chuckled to herself. "Why don't you ask him yourself?"

Akame was confused about what she meant before a loud crash was heard, the sound of glass breaking, and from the mansion emerged a streak of red flying high into the sky. It curved back down as if it had a life of its own and slammed down onto the ground between the two opposing groups, creating a plume of smoke and wind that blew back their hair for a few seconds before finally settling down.

Upon closer inspection the bright red light the thing was emitting was in fact flickering flames, and that the _thing_ itself was actually a human draped in some form of armor. That was the only marker they needed to recognize the figure.

"T-Tatsumi?" questioned Leone when she stood up to his full height and glared at them.

"Incursio...it evolved…" uttered Lubbock in awe.

What he said was indeed true. Tyrant, after being bested in combat, had decided to gift Tatsumi with an evolution for Incursio, boosting the armor's abilities and also changing its appearance to go alongside it. In this new form, Incursio now had a segmented, savage, reptilian-based look with claws on the gauntlets and feet, longer horns and a secondary pair of eyes on the helmet. Even Neuntote had changed, the spear now much larger then before.

Tatsumi popped his neck and inhaled deeply, letting out the breath slow and steady. The newly accumulated power coursing through his veins was incredible; he felt like he could do anything.

" ** _How are you feeling, Boy?_** "

" _Tyrant? How are you talking with me?_ " he asked of the Danger Beast.

" ** _You humans really are stupid. This latest evolution, I made it to where I can communicate with you, to share my knowledge._** " said Tyrant with a snort, Tatsumi rolling his eyes.

"Is that really you, Tatsumi?" asked Akame, Tatsumi fixing his gaze on her and nodding.

"Hi, everyone." he replied, the members of Night Raid relaxing somewhat.

Finding out he was still alive had brought some relief to them, and seeing that he still possessed Incursio _and_ that it had just evolved was also a plus. However, they had no clue that they were about to receive one of the greatest shocks ever.

"What did _she_ do to you in there? How were you able to escape?" asked Lubbock while emphasizing a certain blue-haired General.

"About that...I thought I'd have more time to think of what I was going to say, but...Guys, I'm sorry." said Tatsumi with a tinge of regret, his answer confusing them.

"Sorry for what?" asked Leone, Tatsumi lowering his gaze.

"For this."

Tatsumi, step by step, slowly made his way back until he stood next to Esdeath, the other Jaegers gathering around them.

To say the least, they were absolutely dumbfounded. Even the normally stoic Susanoo was visibly shocked by the sudden turn of events. They never would have expected Tatsumi to defect from Night Raid and join their enemy, and a majority of their thought process was devoted to trying to figure out _why_. Nobody though was more affected by his betrayal then Akame.

A look of horror had painted itself on her face. Even from where he stood, Tatsumi could see small tears beginning to form in the corners of her eyes.

" _Tatsumi...why…?_ " thought Najenda in sorrow as she looked down from above.

They weren't the only ones hurting, though. Tatsumi thanked god that Incursio's armor covered up his face as well because he was nearly on the verge of tears as well, the look on not only Akame's face but every single one of his friend's faces standing before him causing his heart to squeeze and contort in the most twisted way.

He had made this choice, however, and he was going to stick by it.

"This is my family now. And if you threaten their lives...I won't hesitate to hurt you." he stated with a slightly harsh tone as he hefted Neuntote up and pointed its sharpened tip right at them, his eyes narrowing.

Esdeath quickly glanced at Tatsumi and could see in his eyes alone how much he was suffering right now. She couldn't help but feel sorry for him, and she made a silent promise to make it up to him for putting him in this position later.

Meanwhile across from the Jaegers, Night Raid was at a complete loss of what to do. They had come to the capital to rescue Tatsumi and Chelsea, but instead they ended up discovering that he had no plans of leaving and changed sides. They didn't even know of Chelsea's fate. Was she alive? Was she dead?

All of these questions and more were swirling around through their heads like a hurricane, but for Akame...there was now only one clear course of action to take.

"I'm changing the mission." she uttered in almost as whisper, Tatsumi tensing up when he felt her killer intent spike. "Kill the Jaegers."

In that instant a bright flash sounded off in the distance and Tatsumi instantly raised up his spear, a beam of spirit energy striking the blade and splitting off in all directions, causing no harm to him but definitely broadcasting who had fired the shot.

"Run, there's a sniper in the distance. You saw where?"

"Yes, I'll take care of it." he replied as his wings unfurled and he took off to the skies while Tatsumi got down low and held Neuntote up high when Akame rushed at him with Leone at her side.

They criss-crossed once before Akame dove to the right and went straight for Esdeath, Leone launching herself at him with a rage-filled expression on her face.

"How could you join the Jaegers?!" she shouted as she threw a punch at his head, Tatsumi moving to the side and avoiding it easily.

"It would take too long to explain, I'm sorry." he replied before he swept her legs out from under her and aimed with Neuntote to impale her through the gut.

To his surprise she took the blow and grasped tightly onto the spear, a grin on her face. "Susanoo!"

The Teigu appeared beside him and before Tatsumi could react he smashed his staff into the side of his head and blew him away, his spear going with him. Meanwhile Esdeath and Akame were exchanging furious blows, the latter scowling at the General heavily while the former merely grinned at her in excitement.

" _I need to keep my attacks irrational and unexpected, or she'll figure me out and counter._ " thought Akame as she ducked to avoid a stab at her abdomen and aimed for Esdeath's throat.

"Nice try." she said when a thick slab of ice appeared in the air before her neck and stopped Murasame from reaching its target. "But there's nothing you can do to kill me!"

Suddenly a loud bang sounded off like something just broke the sound barrier and Tatsumi was immediately right next to her, his fist cocked back and aimed right for Akame's jaw. She managed to bring her arm up to block the punch but the force from the hit alone was enough to send her flying.

Susanoo caught her in the air and dusted her off while glaring at Tatsumi, who shifted stances and stood by Esdeath once again.

"I don't need protecting, you know." she said, Tatsumi glancing back at her and winking.

"Yeah, I know."

Over in another portion of the courtyard, Wave and Kurome were fighting Lubbock and his wire, which he had managed to spin and attach to everything around them and greatly restrict Kurome's movement while Wave was protected thanks to Grand Chariot. He had formed a navy blue and grey cutlass in his hand named Silber, its purpose just like Neuntote, and was using it with great skill to block and parry Lubbock's wire-made weapons.

"Your Teigu cannot harm me! My Grand Chariot is impenetrable." he taunted of Lubbock, the green-haired assassin growling to himself.

"There's no use in resisting. You'll be one of my puppets soon enough." said Kurome with a smile as she finally unsheathed her Teigu, Yatsufusa, and summoned the body of her close friend from the Group of Terror, Natala.

On the other side of the mansion, Run had managed to chase Mine, the sniper who had attempted to hit Tatsumi from afar, from her vantage point and around the mansion onto the training field where Bols was waiting with Rubicante already secreting fire from its nozzle.

" _Oh shit!_ " thought Mine when she saw the Jaeger raise the flamethrower up and aim its flaming nozzle straight at her, his finger on the trigger.

"Mine!"

She looked up and thanked god when Najenda passed by overhead and launched down her prosthetic arm's fist, Mine grabbing onto the tether and getting pulled up just moments before Bols unleashed a stream of fire at where she formerly was.

Upon retracting her all the way up Najenda tossed Mine onto the back of the flying manta, who immediately began to shoot at Run with Pumpkin when he soared up to their altitude and gave chase with his Teigu, Mastema.

Back in the front courtyard Esdeath and Tatsumi were fighting toe-to-toe with Akame and Susanoo, Leone having left to go and fight Solomon in a grueling match of close-quarters combat. Incursio's newly evolved form was making it extremely difficult for Susanoo to land meaningful blows on him, and since Akame's Murasame was basically useless against the armor, he was the only one able to battle him.

However, even with the One-Cut Killer's lethal poison, Esdeath was more then managing with the assassin with her rapier and had even landed several blows on her, ranging from a decently sized cut on her left arm to the several bruises Akame knew were on her abdomen.

"What, getting tired already?" asked Esdeath after she blocked another strike from Akame, their swords grinding up against one another and the young assassin growling at her.

She leaped back and rolled to the side when the general launched a swarm of razor sharp icicles at her, the projectiles embedding themselves into the soft dirt inches behind her. When she got up and wiped some dirt away from her eyes Susanoo was suddenly tossed to the ground beside her, his right arm and a large cut in his leg beginning to regenerate.

"This is bad. We need to retreat." he stated sourly as he helped her up and glared at Tatsumi and Esdeath, the former having been the one to injure him.

"How can we?" asked Akame under her breath, the Teigu smiling at her as he produced a pair of earplugs from his sleeve.

"You might need these."

After inserting them into her ears, Akame gripped her sword tightly and stood beside the now fully recovered Susanoo, Esdeath and Tatsumi watching them carefully when the Teigu raised a hand up and squeezed his fists three times.

Najenda noticed the signal from above and clenched her jaw muscles. " _Damn, we really did have to resort to him afterall._ "

She looked out at the city, unsure of where that "he" was, but still she was confident in the fact that signal had been received and they would soon be out of this.

"Ready for round two?" asked Esdeath, Susanoo holding out a hand in front of Akame in order to protect her.

She and Tatsumi were about to charge before they each felt a new presence make itself known, their eyes darting up to the very top of the mansion and spotting a lone figure dressed in a large cloak, his face obscured behind a scarf and a conical straw hat with small ornamental torques and tassels hanging off it. In his hands was an instrument of some sort, Tatsumi guessing that it was a guitar based off its appearance.

"Who is that?" he asked, Esdeath narrowing her eyes and making out the single visible red eye glaring back down at her.

Without a word, the unknown individual raised his right hand up high into the air, his other at the ready with his fingers spread out among the strings. "Piercing Scream."

He brought his hand down and played a single, high pitched note that at first didn't seem like much before, in a matter of seconds, the sound increased in volume until it became a ear-piercing wail that caused all of the Jaegers to fall to their knees and cover their ears. Tatsumi caught Esdeath in his arms when her legs gave out and her rapier fell from her hand when she pulled it up to her ears with her other hand to try and block out the sound.

Thankfully Incursio nullified the effect the tune was having on him somewhat and he was able to still stand up and watch as Najenda brought down her flying manta and retrieved the members of Night Raid, the unknown individual that had created the noise leaping onto its back as it took off. Instead of pursuing, he watched them leave and helped Esdeath back to her feet once the noise finally ceased and allowed their eardrums to rest.

"Is everyone okay?" shouted Tatsumi, one by one the Jaegers making their way back to the front courtyard and announcing their condition.

Run turned a corner with his arm curled up into his chest and he smiled weakly, Kurome and Wave running over to him after the latter had dispelled Grand Chariot. "I broke my arm after I lost concentration and fell back down to the ground, but other then that I'm fine."

Tatsumi nodded and he deactivated Incursio, its key appearing in the sheath on its back while he grasped Esdeath by the shoulders and looked her over.

"Are you okay?" he asked, Esdeath shaking her head slightly to get the ringing out of her ears before she looked at him and nodded.

"Wait…" she started, her eyes widening when she realized that instead of her looking down at him, the roles had been flipped. "Are you taller?"

 **\- Ten Minutes Later -**

"So after you defeated Tyrant, he evolved Incursio and that's why it looked different from last time?" asked Wave, Tatsumi nodding as he rested an icepack on his ribcage and let out a sigh of relief.

Even though he wore the armor, getting hit in the gut by Susanoo's weapon still felt like a boulder had struck him in the gut. He was sore, but thankfully that was the extent of it.

"But how does that explain you being taller? And what's up with your eye too?" asked Kurome, Tatsumi blinking a few times before he felt a familiar presence inside his mind.

" ** _It's simple Boy, I fused Incursio to you. Your eye proves it._** "

" _What?!_ "

" ** _Don't act so surprised. That is how I'm able to speak with you after all. Now I'm going to rest, we expelled a lot of power today for the first time in this new evolution. Farewell._** "

Tatsumi quickly asked for a mirror and Bols handed one to him, Tatsumi looking at himself and gasping when he saw that his right eye had indeed changed, its normally green color now morphed into a red one with the pupil a cross-slit, perfectly mirroring Tyrant's eyes. He set the mirror down and shook his head in disbelief, the Jaegers waiting anxiously for his answer.

"Apparently, Tyrant fused Incursio with me. That's why, I guess." he replied, Wave's jaw dropping open while Kurome grinned.

"That's amazing! I never thought one could fuse with their Teigu!" exclaimed Bols while Run used his still working arm, the other in a sling, to scratch his chin and ponder the idea.

"I guess it would be feasible considering Tyrant's flesh still lives on within Incursio...this is definitely interesting."

"Well, everybody, I think we all deserve a break after tonight." stated Esdeath as she walked over to Tatsumi and rested a hand on his shoulder and cheek, Tatsumi gripping one and smiling at her. "You all can retire to your rooms."

"No arguments there chief!" said Solomon as he picked himself up and stuck his hands in his coat pockets.

"Actually, I have something to say before you go."

All eyes turned on Chelsea, who by now had not been noticed, as she stood awkwardly on her own with her hands behind her back. She looked nervous, but all she needed was a reassuring look from Tatsumi and she got the courage back to speak her mind.

"I-I think I'll stay here." she said to everyone present before she addressed Tatsumi directly. "I'm not joining the Jaegers, I still think I'm a part of Night Raid, but if they see me here they'll assume I'm one of you."

"I'm sorry to say, Chelsea, but considering how your friends reacted upon seeing Tatsumi, it's safe to assume that you aren't a member of Night Raid anymore." said Solomon after fixating his gaze on her, Chelsea looking at him and sighing.

"I guess you're right…"

"It's fine." he replied, going over to her to wrap an arm around her shoulders and comfort her. "I'm still a newbie here too, so you're not alone."

She smiled somewhat and Esdeath motioned with her hand to the Jaegers, silently telling them to go on and enjoy their break. "Is it okay if you stay with Solomon, Chelsea?"

The now former Night Raid member nodded and with that the Jaegers dispersed from the living room, leaving just Esdeath and Tatsumi alone. She turned and looked at him with a grin on her face, Tatsumi recognizing the expression and chuckling to himself. It's that time now, he guessed.

A few minutes later the lights had been turned off, the doors locked, and the fireplace the living room offered had been lit and was providing an ample amount of warmth for the two as that laid on their sides underneath a blanket. They had shed their clothes, with Tatsumi only wearing his boxer shorts while Esdeath was entirely naked, and she sat with her back curled up against his chest. He held up his head with one arm while with the other he ran his fingers through her silky blue hair and down a portion of her back, his touch sending chills up her spine.

"Tatsumi, what you said back there in front of your...friends…" she said quietly, unsure of what to call Night Raid now that he was a traitor in their eyes.

"What about it?" he asked.

"I'm sorry you were put in a situation like that. I could see how much it hurt for you to betray them like that." she said, Tatsumi stopping his hand going through the strands of her hair for a moment.

"It was going to happen eventually." he said, a sigh escaping from his lips. "Deep down though, I still believe though that instead of fighting each other, we can be on the same side and change the Empire."

" _This is your chance._ " Esdeath told herself as she prepared the words she wanted to say.

"About that, while you were comatose after Tyrant tried to take over your body, I made a promise to myself. I said that after you woke up, I would have my answer about you wanting to change the Empire. I intend to keep that promise." she said, Tatsumi's eyes widening when the subject was brought up once again.

He hadn't thought that Esdeath would bring it up, let alone already have an answer for him, so instead of saying anything else he remained silent and waited patiently for her to continue while he stroked her hair again.

"When you said that the Empire is rife with corruption...you were right, it is. I see it almost constantly while I walk its streets. Before now though I never thought twice about it because all I cared about was the thrill of battle and torture." she said, making sure to say the second term lightly since it was still a sore subject with Tatsumi. "I still enjoy fighting, I always will, but...Now, with you...I don't know how, but you were able to change that about me. I'm even beginning to doubt my father's creed, the strong will live while the weak perish."

Tatsumi was absolutely astounded by how the conversation was going. Whereas before she was adamant with her beliefs, somehow, _someway_...he had managed to dig underneath her defenses and had began to change that.

"I hate it, but I also love it at the same time." said Esdeath as she reached up and held Tatsumi's hand. "And if you are able to do that to me...I believe that you will, no, _we_ will be able to do so on an even greater scale."

"What are you saying…?" asked Tatsumi slowly, Esdeath smiling softly as she intertwined her fingers with his.

"I'm saying that I'll help you. I'll help you change the Empire." she said, Tatsumi blinking a few times in disbelief.

It took him a few seconds to realize it but she was totally sincere with her proclamation. Soon a smile spread across his face and he said, "Thank you. I appreciate you saying that."

 **\- Night Raid HQ -**

 **\- Several Hours Later -**

Najenda had flown Night Raid and their guest to their new HQ, which had just been finished while they were gone, and after settling in they all gathered in the meeting hall with Najenda sitting in her usual chair with a depressed look on her face. Akame had her head lowered, her hair covering her eyes, Susanoo was leaning up against a wall with his arms crossed, and Lubbock and Leone stood side by side with Mine next to the latter, all three just as depressed as their boss.

They may have gotten out alive, but they had still experienced a heavy loss. Tatsumi, a valued friend and wielder of Incursio, had defected to the enemy. And Chelsea was still nowhere to be found, so they assumed that either she was killed or she joined the Jaegers as well after some persuasion.

"Dammit…" cursed Lubbock under his breath as he rubbed his right arm, which was still aching after he received a punch from the Jaeger in the blue armor.

Finally, after the silence lingered for at least five minutes, Najenda decided to speak and alleviate some of the stress. "The circumstances are indeed grim, but there is at least one ray of sunshine."

"And what would that be, Boss?" asked Leone with a glare at Najenda. "Because quite frankly, everything to me right now seems like shit."

All of sudden, the sweet sound of a guitar was heard emanating from a lonely corner of the meeting hall, the tune being played slowly but surely relaxing them and their tempered nerves. Najenda smiled and silently thanked the music's source when everyone turned around and glanced at the man that had rescued them from the Jaegers.

He still had his face hidden behind his straw hat and scarf, but from the small portion of his face that remained visible they could see he had his eye closed and a sort-of peaceful expression on his face.

" _He must be really passionate about his music._ " thought Najenda when the man finally finished his tune and rested his guitar at his feet, standing up to his full height a second later and opening his eye.

"Sorry to keep you all waiting for so long." he said with a courteous bow as he removed his straw hat. "My name is Gazia."

"That guitar, I'm assuming it's your Teigu?" asked Lubbock with an index finger pointed at the demonic-looking guitar, its black and blue color scheme matching Gazia's attire.

The man nodded.

"I believe its name is Isterio, correct? Malevolent Solo: Isterio?" asked Najenda, Gazia fixing his visible eye on her and crossing his arms. "I've heard stories and rumors about that Teigu, how it was considered cursed."

"Cursed?" asked Leone, Susanoo nodding a few times as he finally opened his eyes and glared at the guitar intensely.

"I remember that name. Isterio...the cursed guitar, capable of emitting tunes and hymns that could kill any number of men. It was considered cursed because to use the Teigu, one must perfectly enact a musical piece that will bond them to the weapon, and if they mess up even a single part...they'll instantly die." stated Susanoo darkly, Gazia slowly nodding to confirm that what he had said was true.

They all looked at the demonic guitar out of fear and wondered just how the man had been able to perform the song required to bond with the Teigu, and just how many people before him had been claimed by its curse.

"Indeed, that is all true. Currently, I am only the second person ever to wield Isterio, the first being a woman who lived during the reign of the First Emperor. Also, there have been at least one hundred and fifty attempts made to try and control Isterio, all of them obviously failures."

"You seem to know a lot about your Teigu and the history behind it. Just how old are you exactly?" asked Najenda, her own curiosity showing itself.

Gazia chuckled as he leaned up against the wall and leaned down to pick up Isterio and grasp it once again, his fingers running over the strings and creating a small tune.

"Well...my appearance is that of myself at twenty five years old, but my true age is two hundred and thirty five years old."

Their mouths dropped to the floor in total shock, the man's age completely unreal. There couldn't be anyone that old, it was physically impossible. But then again, considering what Teigu could do, there was a small possibility that the reason behind his extended age had to do with Isterio.

"And before you ask, yes, it is because of my Teigu. Well, more specifically its Trump Card, "Final Concerto - Melody of the Lich". It enables me to suck the life force out of an individual and increase my own lifespan." he explained, Akame finally looking up and staring at him with a distant look.

"So...you were alive before Prime Minister Honest?" she asked, Gazia nodding.

"Yes...I saw firsthand what that man did to the Empire. That was the main reason why I joined the Revolutionary Army after its founding. That's also why I've stayed alive for so long. I want to live long enough to see this corrupt Empire and that Minister taken down and replaced by a new, free nation. Like the one I remembered from my childhood." he said while reminiscing of memories past.

His fists tightened and behind the cover of his scarf he clenched his jaw and scowled, his hatred for the current state of the Empire and what Honest has done to it turning his blood into fire. He gazed at Najenda and she could already tell what he was going to ask.

"Najenda, I want to know if you'll allow me to join Night Raid so that I can exact my revenge. Plus, considering the events that just took place earlier, you are in need of a new member."

"You may." she said almost immediately, Gazia nodding once as he returned his straw hat to his head.

"Thank you, Boss. I won't let you down."


	8. Planning in Advance

A/N There is the second OC I have created being introduced, Gazia, user of the Teigu Malevolent Solo: Isterio, which is also of my own design. His character profile alongside that of his Teigu is already on the wiki including pictures, so you guys will be able to see what he looks like if my description wasn't good enough. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 7 - Planning in Advance**

Tatsumi and Esdeath woke up in the same position they went to sleep in before the living room fireplace, and after the last night's battle they were definitely feeling the repercussions.

"Oh god...it feels like my ribs are on fire." said Tatsumi with a groan when the soreness set in.

"Don't be such a wimp." remarked Esdeath as she rolled herself over and gave him her usual grin. "Besides...I can help loosen up those muscles if you want me too."

She reached under the blanket they had shared and ran her hand gently over his crotch.

"No, I'm good for now." he replied quickly, Esdeath's grin widening when she felt him start to get aroused by her touch.

"Are you sure…?" she asked in a seductive tone, a heavy blush appearing on Tatsumi's face.

His boxer shorts had become a tent by now and he was struggling to keep himself composed. Slowly though his inner desires began to win control over his body, and the idea of having sex with her again started to sound more and more like a good idea.

"Well...um…" he started to say before Esdeath pulled off the blanket covering them and tugged down his boxer shorts, running her hand up and down his shaft.

She looked him dead in the eyes as she licked her lips and leaned forward, her hand pausing its motion to allow her to plant a kiss on the tip of his cock. She then took it a step further by parting her lips and curling them around it, sucking on it lightly before pushing her head all the way down and taking in his entire length.

Tatsumi clenched his fists when a sensational feeling of electricity coursed through him, Esdeath glancing up at him for another second before she brought her head up around halfway then slid back down. She was slow at first since this was new to her too, but soon enough she began to bob her head up and down, gently sucking on his erect member. She went on for a few more seconds before she pulled back up and stroked him with her hand again while staring at him with a grin on her face.

"How about _now_ …?" she asked lustfully, Tatsumi sighing heavily and shaking his head.

" _Fine then, if that's the game you want to play._ "

He let her have her fun for a moment, the grin never leaving her face, before in a flash he grabbed her wrists and flipped her onto her back, pinning her to the floor. She was shocked by how sudden and quick the movement had been, but after getting put into the position her cheeks grew bright red and she lowered her gaze, feeling exposed and weak.

"It's _my_ turn this time." said Tatsumi with authority in his tone, Esdeath's blush growing.

"F-Fine...but just this once!" she said timidly, Tatsumi grinning at her shyness.

She definitely wasn't used to being told what to do, and he guessed that the only reason he had even gotten this far was that she was allowing it to happen because it was him.

He let go of her wrists and placed one hand on her hip and the other on one of her breasts, Esdeath letting out a moan when he squeezed it and let the soft flesh mold itself around his fingers. She interlocked her fingers around his neck when he slid his cock into her, the two lovers now becoming one.

Instead of taking it slow like the first time, he immediately began to piston in and out of her at a rapid pace, his movements causing her breasts to bounce back and forth.

It felt like bolts of lightning were shooting off through Esdeath's veins each and every time Tatsumi thrusted into her, and as a result her mind had started to go blank In every essence of the world, she was getting drunk off the pleasure, and she was loving every single second of it.

"Don't stop...I want more…!" she said huskily, Tatsumi silently obliging as he turned her on her side and hoisted her right leg up over his shoulder.

The new angle and position brought an entirely new and different feeling of delight to Esdeath, so much so that she gasped a let out a slightly high-pitched moan out of pure ecstasy.

"Yes...Yes!" she exclaimed as she grabbed onto one of her breasts and began to pleasure herself. "Tatsumi!"

He continued to move in and out of her, slowing down sometimes in between to allow himself a short break before he would immediately pick back up again at his original pace. This went on for at least five minutes before he could feel himself near the end, and it only took a single look at Esdeath and the happiness she was expressing to drive him over the edge.

He pushed inside her as far as he could go and shot his load, Esdeath gasping when she felt his seed enter her womb and coat her inner walls. Tatsumi let out a breath after waiting for a second and removed his cock from her wet sex, letting go of her leg at the same time before falling onto his back.

"Tatsumi…" said Esdeath as she crawled over next to him, her bare breasts pressed up against his arm. "We forgot…"

"Forgot what?" he asked before Esdeath smiled and traced out the outline of a certain object on his chest.

His eyes widened when he realized what she meant and he gulped ever-so-slightly. "Oh...that."

"We got caught up in the moment." she said regretfully. "I'm sorry, I should've said something.

She was surprised when he curled his arm around her and ran a hand through her hair, his innocent smile showing itself again as he laughed.

"No, it's fine." said Tatsumi, Esdeath looking up with wide eyes. "I would love to have a child with you."

Esdeath continued to look at him for a few more seconds in utter disbelief before a single tear came to her eye, a smile spreading across her face.

"W-We're gonna have a child…" she murmured out of joy before wiping the tears from her eyes.

Tatsumi didn't say anything else, choosing instead to continue stroking her hair and remain beside her. She snuggled up against him and he chuckled, the warmth her naked body was giving off making him feel drowsy and only adding on to the tiredness he felt after having sex with her.

Seems they would be sleeping in for a little while longer.

 **\- Western Border of the Empire -**

The world was moving in slow motion. The birds flapped their wings every five minutes, the leaves rustled every three, and the slight touch of the wind blew by every six.

He didn't care. He liked it like this. The saying "blink and you'll miss it" did not apply to him. Seconds were minutes, minutes were hours, and everything else after that felt like an eternity. The beauty of nature and the world around him was exemplified since every moment seemed to last forever.

But he wasn't here for sightseeing, unfortunately. Three and a half kilometers ahead of him, down in an empty plain surrounded by rolling green hills next to the border separating the Empire from the hostile Western Nations, was a fierce battle raging between two armies, one from the Empire, the other from the west.

And his job, with Teigu in hand, a cousin of Roman Artillery: Pumpkin, was to wreak havoc and chaos on the enemy from far behind the Empire's lines. This was what he lived for, his purpose.

He was known infamously among the Empire and beyond as the God of Death, a master assassin who had an impeccable kill record. No one ever escaped from him. Not a single shot wasted. One shot, one kill.

"I apologize for the sins I am about to commit. Forgive me." he said in almost a whisper as he reached down and pulled up the cross hanging around his neck, kissed it and looked down the scope of his Teigu.

He could perfectly see the faces of his targets as if they were right in front of him, even though he was standing on a cliff overlooking the valley three and a half kilometers behind the battle. As per regulation, he aimed for the commanding officer first and pulled the trigger. In a matter of seconds the man dropped dead with a scorching hole through the center of his forehead. He moved on to the next target, and the next, and the next.

With each pull of the trigger, a concentrated beam of pure white plasma was fired out from the barrel, traveling the distance between it and the target, and ensuring their death every single time.

The God of Death moved from one to the other as soon as the previous one received a shot, never sticking around too long, for if he were to continue watching their lifeless bodies begin to descend to the ground...it would take an eternity.

This was Brahmastra's, his Teigu, blessing and curse. He could see for thousands of miles and could see the entire world in slow motion, to be able to dodge bullets with ease, and he hated it all.

" _I'm sorry._ " thought the God of Death regretfully before he killed his thirty fifth target.

And he was only just getting started. But, thankfully, the battle lasted for a few more minutes and it resulted in the Empire's forces claiming victory, the surviving soldiers from the Western Nations retreating with their tails between their legs. The God of Death let out a long breath as he relaxed his muscles and lowered the Teigu in his grasp.

"Lord, give me the strength to continue on this path, and that you may forgive my sins." he recited to himself as he shouldered Brahmastra and closed his eyes, the burning sensation that had started to become evident for using them making it uncomfortable.

It was time to rejoin his allies and return to the capital.

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

After around forty five minutes of lying down in each other's arms with the blanket underneath, Esdeath finally decided to get up and begin picking up her clothes and unlock the doors to the living room.

"So, what are we gonna do today?" asked Tatsumi as he slipped on his pants, Esdeath stopping for a moment to think on the matter.

"Well, I do have to go to the Imperial Palace and meet with the Emperor and Prime Minister to receive orders. I'll probably have to leave the capital if there's a distant battle I need to fight." she stated, Tatsumi stiffening up at the mentioning of _him_.

She noticed the reaction and walked over to him, placing her hands on his shoulders and gently massaging them while she looked at him with a small smile.

"If you want, you can come with me and analyze the layout of the palace. That's something that should be accounted for when we take down the Prime Minister." she said, Tatsumi brightening up a little.

"You really will help me take down Honest?" he asked, Esdeath nodding.

"You haven't lied to me once, so neither should I." she replied before she gave him a quick kiss.

She leaned back and winked at him before she started to walk over to the door she had left her clothes next to, intending to grab them on the way out. Unexpectedly the doorknob turned and she froze, the door swinging inward and a foot stepping past the frame and into the room.

"Hey, what are we-" asked Wave as he entered the room and looked at the first thing in his line of sight, which was Esdeath.

Unfortunately she was still naked, so as soon as Wav saw her he tensed up and became rooted to the ground, his eyes widened in utter shock. Tatsumi was unable to do anything to stop him, and he was fearful of what would happen because of it. Nobody moved, nobody spoked. The tension in the air was high.

Suddenly Kurome popped her head into the room and asked, "Wave? Are you okay?"

It only took her a second to realize what the problem was and she rolled her eyes as she stepped up to wave and took a hold of his hand.

"Hi Captain, Hi Tatsumi. I'll take care of him for you."

"Hello Kurome." replied Esdeath with a smile, Kurome returning the gesture as she reached up and hit Wave on the back of the neck, knocking him out cold and causing his body to crumple to the floor.

She dragged him out by his feet and closed to door behind her, leaving Esdeath and Tatsumi alone again with an overwhelming sense of awkwardness between them.

"I suggest we get to our room as quick as possible and get dressed so another situation like that doesn't happen again."

"Agreed."

They quickly navigated their way through the winding halls of the mansion back up to their room, changing into clean clothes as soon as they got there. And soon enough they were leaving the Jaegers HQ and walking down the road towards the brightly shining Imperial Palace rising up from the center of the city.

Tatsumi couldn't help but marvel at how beautifully crafted the palace was, its white and green colors representing the royal family of the Emperor and showcasing how much power they held.

The Emperor. That's right, he was the Prime Minister's puppet. It's unfortunate that he was being misled by the corrupt politician, and he hoped that when the day came for Honest's death he would be spared. Then he had a thought. Being there at the palace would be the perfect opportunity to assassinate him, but these things take time. He could wait.

"Is this your first time being at the Imperial Palace?" asked Esdeath as they approached the massive circular wall protecting the palace grounds.

"Yes...I never would've imagined that it would be this large." replied Tatsumi in awe before his attention was drawn to the heavily guarded entrance they would be passing through.

There were three iron gates in total, with a checkpoint consisting of armored soldiers wielding shields and _very_ sharp halberds stationed at each. They bore the colors of the royal family, so Tatsumi assumed they must be members of the Imperial Guard.

When they reached the first gate a guard with a colored shoulder pauldron, most likely the commanding officer, smiled at them from behind his helmet and set the end of his halberd's rod on the ground.

"Meeting with the Emperor again, I assume?" he asked.

Esdeath placed a hand on her hip and grinned, saying, "Would there really be any other reason for me to come here?"

The Imperial Guard laughed as he stepped aside and waved them through, a mere glance at the necklace hanging around Tatsumi's neck the only identification he needed to be let past without any hindrance.

" _Wow, she was right about the necklace._ " he thought with a smirk as he nodded once at the guard before following Esdeath when the first iron gate was raised up. They went through a similar process at the other two checkpoints before finally stepping back out into the sunlight on the road leading right up to the front doors of the palace.

As they walked past rows of well-trimmed trees on either side of the road Tatsumi could see that the entire palace was made out of marble, and that some portions used actual _gold_. The grass was also neatly cut, the service obviously done by trained professionals.

"A majority of the Imperial Guards are always stationed in and on the wall, by the way. A special regimen, the Faceless, are the ones that guard the interior of the palace. They're few in number, but they are the strongest soldiers the Empire possesses, next to the Generals of course, and their loyalty to the Prime Minister is undying." stated Esdeath while pointing to a pair of guards positioned on either side of the main entrance.

Compared to the Imperial Guards outside the wall, these men seemed to be less-armored and only carried a halberd, but just from their appearance alone he felt a chill run up and down his spine. The name "The Faceless" was derived from the armor that they wear, consisting of loose ceremonial robes colored a dark navy blue, decently sized shoulder pauldrons, and covering the entirety of their head and upper neck was a helmet with no visible distinctions or orifices whatsoever, just a simple black visor to allow them to see. Tatsumi guessed that underneath the robes they also wore armor as well.

When Esdeath and him approached the front doors the Faceless immediately pushed them inward and stood at attention before them, allowing them to enter the Imperial Palace. Another thing that unnerved him about the guards was that they were utterly silent.

" _Are they even human?_ " he thought after the doors were closed shut behind them.

What caught his attention now was that after stepping foot inside the palace it was like he had stepped into an entirely different world. There were massive chandeliers hanging from the ceiling practically every ten feet. The marble floors were covered with thick red carpets and the walls were adorned with exceptional paintings and golden candle holders that offered a luminescent glow.

Esdeath led the way through the massive palace interior and after a few minutes, they entered the large pillared room directly before the doors of the throne room. She glanced over at Tatsumi and she noticed the tension in his jaw and knew that being this close to the one person he hated most was putting him on edge.

She reached over and held his hand, Tatsumi smiling slightly and relaxing at her touch.

"You can wait out here if you want to. It shouldn't take long." said Esdeath when they reached the oak doors protecting the throne room.

Tatsumi nodded and shared a quick kiss with her before stepping to the side so she could knock on the doors a few times. A few seconds passed before a pair of Faceless on the inside opened them up for her to walk inside.

When the heavy oak doors closed with a loud creak, Tatsumi leaned up against the wall next to them and crossed his arms, delving deep into his thoughts to pass by the time. He didn't know how many minutes had passed before the large doors on the other side of the hall opened inward and someone Tatsumi didn't recognize strided in, his large cape flapping behind him. He guessed by his appearance however that it was someone within the Imperial Military, so when the man addressed him directly he responded the only way he could.

"I presume you came here with Esdeath?"

"Yes, sir." replied Tatsumi as the man walked up to him and crossed his arms, his glare causing him to feel uncomfortable.

"Do you possess a Teigu?"

Tatsumi nodded and he removed Incursio's key from the sheath strapped onto his back. "Demon Armor: Incursio."

The man's eyes narrowed for a fraction of a second before he hid his feelings behind a stone-cold expression yet again.

"Ah, the precursor of Grand Chariot. That means you're also a member of the Jaegers as well?" he asked, Tatsumi nodding as he sheathed Incursio's key.

"Did you take that Teigu from the One-Hundred Man Slayer Bulat of Night Raid?"

Tatsumi froze up, the name of his big-brother figure from Night Raid striking a chord within him, but he was able to mask his reaction and quickly craft a lie in his mind that would deal accordingly with the situation. It wasn't really a total lie either, some of it was truth.

"Yes, sir. Although not through battle. I witnessed him fight Teigu users from Esdeath's army."

"The Three Beasts?"

"Yes. All four ended up dying, so I decided to take the opportunity I was presented with to take Incursio as my own."

The man observed Tatsumi for a few seconds out of suspicion before he closed his eyes and relaxed slightly, seemingly satisfied with the story he was presented with.

At that moment the throne room doors were opened up by the Faceless and Esdeath walked past them, her eyes immediately darting to the large man standing next to Tatsumi.

"Ah, General. I didn't expect you to be here." she said with a grin as she went up next to Tatsumi, the large man fixing his gaze on her.

"I'm merely here to speak with the Prime Minister about matters pertaining to the Revolutionary Army. It was a pleasure speaking with your subordinate." he replied before he briskly turned and strode towards the still open throne room doors, his massive figure disappearing behind them when they were closed.

"So he's a General too?" asked Tatsumi, Esdeath's grin fading and getting replaced with a frown.

"Not just any General." she said, Tatsumi glancing at her and getting a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach from her tone alone. "That was Great General Budo, the highest ranked military official in the Empire and leader of the Imperial Guard."

Tatsumi felt as if a heavy weight had just been dropped onto his shoulders. That man he had just been having a conversation with had been _the_ Great General Budo, one of the most feared and respected Generals serving the Empire, aside from Esdeath.

"If we're going to have any chance of assassinating the Prime Minister, we need to not only plan on how to deal with the Imperial Guards and the Faceless, but with him as well." stated Esdeath as they walked back the way they had come.

"Duly noted. So what orders did you get in there?" asked Tatsumi, the frown on Esdeath's face vanishing.

"It's nothing much, we just have to protect an Empire spy named Bolic." she said with the wave of her hand, an indifferent expression appearing on her face. "You do you know of the Path of Peace, correct?"

Tatsumi recognized the name almost immediately and placed his hands in his pockets, his mind drifting back to when he had lived in his village. "Yeah, I do. That came to my village when I was younger."

"The Path of Peace has become a little worrisome and the Prime Minister believes that they'll attempt an insurrection soon, so they sent in Bolic to try and make sure this doesn't happen. The reason why we've been called in is to protect him under the assumption that Night Raid will attempt to remove him from the equation, so to speak." explained Esdeath, Tatsumi's expression becoming grim.

" _Night Raid, huh. Seems meeting them again is gonna be unavoidable now._ "

"But, this might play out in our favor." stated Tatsumi with a slight grin, Esdeath looking at him with an eyebrow raised.

"Let's just say, by some chance, Bolic was to be killed by Night Raid. The Empire's influence within the Path of Peace would crumble and they'll move on with the insurrection, no doubt allying themselves with the Revolutionary Army and the Western Nations." he said, Esdeath becoming more and more interested in what he was getting at. "If that happens, Honest will have to focus most of his resources on dealing with them, leaving us with a perfect opportunity to strike from within right at the heart. We'll be able to bring down the Empire with just a single casualty."

"A silent coup d'etat..." murmured Esdeath as she thought about the prospect for a few moments. "Do you really think we can pull this off without anyone getting killed?"

"I want it to happen. I don't want anyone else I care about to die, especially you, Esdeath." said Tatsumi with determination before he looked at her and smiled, Esdeath blushing.

"I won't die so easily. You know that better then anyone." she replied as they left the Imperial Palace, the pair of Faceless guarding the front doors bidding them a silent farewell.

"Yeah...I do. But still, I won't let any harm come to you. That's a promise."


	9. The Road to War

A/N Still going strong with the above 4k words on every chapter, which still surprises me. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 8 - The Road to War**

"The subject this time is the religion that is being spread through the citizens called the Path of Peace." started Najenda with a blank expression, Lubbock perking up slightly when he recognized the name.

"That's the religion that says doing good deeds contributes to happiness or some crap like that, right?" he asked, Najenda nodding as she exhaled a cloud of smoke from her cigarette.

"Over the past ten years, the Path of Peace has been increasing their adherents and they've become quite influential on the eastern side of the Empire." she continued on, her eyes closing as she stood up and held her hands behind her back. "Soon, the Path of Peace will start an armed uprising, that is, a religious insurrection. We are going to use this for our own purposes."

"If that happens...how many people will die?" asked Leone darkly, Najenda opening her eyes and sighing heavily.

"I don't know. The corrupt politicians of the Empire have been tormenting the citizens for so long that something like this was bound to happen. Even if the Path of Peace's uprising is suppressed, the citizens' anger would explode somewhere else."

"So what you're saying is that this was unavoidable?" asked Leone again, Najenda solemnly nodding.

"Then what's our course of action?" inquired Akame, Gazia stepping forward and crossing his arms.

"It's simple. All-out war." he stated, the members of Night Raid all turning their eyes on him out of doubt.

"How would that work? Do you want to see a lot of people die?" asked Leone with a frown, Gazia chuckling as he glared at her with his visible eye.

"No, of course not. Well, not any of ours, that is. I don't care how many Imperial soldiers have to die in order for the Empire to collapse." he replied harshly, the seriousness in his tone sending chills up and down their spines.

"But I digress. You remember the Ban Tribe and the Northern Tribes, correct? They both revolted and were subsequently suppressed with utter prejudice. They made the mistake of trying to oppose the Empire by themselves, and they paid for it in blood."

"What are you getting at?" asked Mine, Gazia's stare shifting to her.

"We all know that the Empire is incredibly powerful, especially with Esdeath's army and the Jaegers, and that after a while the Path of Peace would be wiped out just like their predecessors."

"Which is why this time, they won't be alone." said Najenda as she pulled out a map and placed it on a table resting before her.

Gazia walked around the piece of furniture and stood next to her, his previous enlistment within the Revolutionary Army enabling him to have extensive knowledge about the current situation and the plans that had been put in place for when the time came.

Najenda pressed a finger on the symbol of the Empire that acted as the Imperial capital and said, "The moment the Path of Peace begins their armed uprising, the Western Nations will begin an attack with all their forces from the western front. They've been having small skirmishes with the Empire's forces to mislead them about their true strength, which far exceeds their expectations."

"They'll have enemies from the inside and outside, but they'll probably withstand even this." stated Gazia before he pointed to the symbol of the Revolutionary Army drawn on the map to the south of the capital. "To back them up, the Revolutionary Army will instigate a revolt from the south as well."

Lubbock rubbed his chin and nodded when he began to put the pieces together. "A three-pronged attack...that might just work."

"The Empire is underestimating the Revolutionary Army. We've been preparing for some time now and we've gathered enough manpower that, if we merge with the Path of Peace and the Western Nations' army before the final push onto the capital, we'll be unstoppable." said Gazia with a grin as he pulled out a dagger from within his sleeve and stabbed it through the symbol of the Empire.

"But it's still gonna be a arduous task, isn't it?" questioned Mine, Najenda crossing her arms.

"The starting point is the frontier of the Empire, which will fall easily enough." she said before pointing to several marked X's on the map in a route to the capital. "However, to get to the capital, the Revolutionary Army will have to cut through several forts and castles."

"Luckily we've already arranged for the betrayals of some of the crown princes of several of the castles. There will still be some we'll have to take down including Shisuikan, the Empire's most heavily armed fortress that acts as the gateway to the capital." said Gazia to continue her statement. "It's normally stacked by regulars from the Imperial Army, but when the Revolutionary Army begins its attack and gets close enough to pose a threat, it will most likely be reinforced by Great General Budo and the Imperial Guard. The ray of sunshine in this fact is that the palace's security will drop sharply.

By now Akame had already figured out what the endgame of the plan was, so she gripped the sheath for Murasame hanging at her side and lifted it up to eye level, her red eyes blazing in silent fury.

"And when that happens...it'll be the perfect opportunity to assassinate the Prime Minister." she said darkly, Leone smirking evilly as she clenched her fists and cracked her knuckles.

"Well break the Empire from the inside-out. I like it. What's stopping us from going on ahead?" she asked, this time Susanoo being the one to speak when he uncrossed his arms and rubbed the bottom of his chin in thought.

"There must be some commotion going on within the Path of Peace that is stopping them from beginning their insurrection."

"Exactly." replied Gazia with an affirmative nod as he reached up and removed his straw hat, running a hand through his messy black hair afterwards. "We've gotten a tip from someone inside that the leader of the Path of Peace, the Lord, has an assistant named Bolic. In truth he is a spy from the Empire brought in by the Prime Minister, whose goal is to seize the Path of Peace and stop the armed uprising from happening."

"We cannot allow that to happen, so this will be our next mission. We will go to the headquarters of the Path of Peace and remove Bolic." finished Najenda with a determined expression, the members of Night Raid nodding in approval.

The plan was now set. Boilc had just become the next target for assassination. With his death, there would be nothing standing in the way of the start of the armed uprising of the Path of Peace and the beginning of the war on the Empire from three fronts. However, both sides had no idea that there were other players making their moves from the shadows, each possessing their own agendas.

 **\- Imperial City of Kyoroch -**

 **\- Four Days Later -**

"It doesn't feel right to be in these clothes. I feel like if anything were to happen we'd be ill-prepared." said Wave with a grunt as he adjusted the tie to his suit, with Kurome standing awkwardly next to him in a red dress and heels.

Upon arriving at the mansion owned by Bolic, the Jaegers minus Bols, Chelsea and Run, the two deciding to stay behind at HQ with Run since his arm was still broken, were greeted with open arms and were immediately invited to join a feast the man was holding. Of course, they graciously accepted, so now inside one of the many rooms the mansion offered the Jaegers were in the middle of getting themselves ready for the party.

Solomon was leaning up against one the pillars in the room with his arms crossed, the red suit he was wearing alongside the white dress shirt underneath matching the hoodie he would normally wear. While he had been taking off his shirt they were treated to the sight of the large phoenix-like tattoo he had on his back, and he had also specifically stated that this would be the only time they would ever see him dress in formal clothes.

"They just don't fit with my style." he had said, which received a round of laughter from the Jaegers.

"Well, it _is_ a welcoming party…"

They all looking to the curtains separating their side of the room from the other and both Wave and Solomon were taken aback by the sight of Esdeath walking out from behind them wearing a honey colored dress with a black hemline and a matching hairband. Tatsumi emerged from behind her with a black suit vest over a white dress shirt, black dress pants, and matching dress shoes.

"So relax and enjoy yourselves. There might be some interesting entertainment." finished Esdeath with a smile.

"Well then, what are we waiting for?" asked Solomon as he pushed himself off the pillar he was resting against and walked towards the exit, Wave and Kurome following behind him and Tatsumi and Esdeath picking up the rear.

It took them a few minutes but they finally reached the expansive ballroom Bolic's mansion offered and were surprised at how many people had already arrived. There were obviously some members of the Path of Peace, but they no doubt were allied with the Empire. Most likely everyone within the room was either allied with Bolic or the Prime Minister, which made their job a whole lot easier in spotting anyone who stood out. There were girls dressed in the traditional attire of the desert region roaming the hall with platters of food Tatsumi had neither seen nor heard of before, but the smells they were giving off was starting to make him feel hungry.

When they reached the other side of the ballroom directly opposite of the entrance, Bolic himself was sitting upon a throne with several strange machines emitting a strange smelling smoke resting behind him and, to Tatsumi's hidden displeasure, sitting around him were four other girls dressed just like the servers. The only difference between them was that these four seemed *off. Their eyes seemed a little foggy and their limbs and expression were too relaxed.

Then it hit him. These women were being drugged, and the source was none other then the smoke emerging from the machines behind Bolic's throne.

" _Bastard...I should kill him right now._ " he thought angrily, but he quickly thought against it. " _No, we have to wait._ "

When they approached him, Bolic smirked and crossed his legs over as if he were a godly king looking down onto his subjects.

"Oh my...I've been feeling threatened lately, so I asked the Prime Minister to send reinforcements skilled in combat...but to think that Esdeath, said to be the strongest in the Empire, would come, there is nothing more reassuring then this!" he said, Tatsumi clenching his fists and keeping his anger in check while Esdeath placed a hand on her hip and glared at Bolic.

He could tell that deep down she was displeased with the man at well, so at least they shared the same mutual feelings about Bolic.

"We'll be borrowing some of your rooms since we've been tasked with guarding you." she said blankly, Bolic's smirk remaining plastered on his face.

"Of Course! Khehe...I doubt you will be bored at my mansion."

Esdeath narrowed her eyes and she waved aside the statement, obviously uninterested in what he was implying considering her relationship with Tatsumi.

"I have no interest in any of those things. However...I would quite like to meet those who are spying on us from above." she asked with a slight grin, Tatsumi looking from her to Bolic and wondering who she was referring to.

He chuckled and raised a hand up, snapping his fingers once. "As expected, you had noticed them."

Suddenly from the darkened portion of the ceiling behind Bolic's throne, four figures dropped down onto the floor and glared at the Jaegers, each sporting a cocky grin that gave a hint to them about their personalities. Esdeath shifted her weight onto her other foot and crossed her arms when she recognized the group, the other Jaegers still clueless about who they were.

"I was lent this lot from the Empire in order to control the Church. Allow me to introduce to you the very picture of violence, the Four Kouken Temple Rakshasa Demons!" announced Bolic proudly, Esdeath's own grin widening.

"Oho. Here I was, wondering why I hadn't seen them in the capital, when in fact they've been here the whole time." she said with a chuckle, Tatsumi analyzing the four supposed demons and wondering what exactly made them so dangerous that they were considered "demons".

" _ **Be cautious of them, Boy. I can sense they're powerful fighters.**_ " said Tyrant, the dragon deciding to make its presence known once again after such a long period of silence.

" _What have you been up to?_ " inquired Tatsumi of the Danger Beast, Tyrant snorting.

" ** _Regenerating my power and also strengthening the bond between you and Incursio._** "

" _How so?_ "

" ** _Well, you still need the key to don my flesh, but I've made it to where without it you can freely manifest that spear, Neuntote, without having the armor on at all._** " explained Tyrant with a sense of pride in himself and his accomplishment.

Tatsumi was impressed and intrigued by the idea of being able to use the spear without Incursio being active, so he gave a silent clap to the dragon and said, " _Really? That sounds interesting. I appreciate it._ "

" ** _You're welcome, runt._** " said Tyrant with a growl before he became silent once more, Tatsumi laughing to himself as he returned his attention to Bolic and the Four Rakshasa Demons.

"Now that you are here, General, these demons that I had been using solely for protection can be devoted to offense." said Bolic, Solomon snorting before he opened his eyes and glared at the man.

"We're here under the assumption that a group of assassins called Night Raid will attempt to kill you. How will you four be able to deal with expert Teigu users when you possess no Teigu of your own?" he asked, the Rakshasa Demon with the purple hair licking his lips and smiling evilly.

In the blink of an eye the man was standing behind Solomon with his hand outstretched and hovering inches away from the side of his neck. He hardly moved and to be honest was surprised by the man's speed, but he hid the reaction and merely glanced over his shoulder at the Demon.

"There's no need to worry about it. We've defeated Teigu users before with just our bare hands."

"Actually, we have already retrieved and presented five Teigus to the Prime Minister." said one of the female Demons, the one with black hair.

The large man with a black beard spoke next, stating with a strong sense of pride, "Teigus may be strong, but their users are naught but human."

"Which means there are countless ways to win against them, right?" asked the last girl with dark skin with a smile, Solomon glancing back at them for a second before he snorted again and glared back at the first Demon.

"Oh _really_?" he questioned when he fully turned around and willingly brought up his left hand and from the interior of his sleeve he slipped out a hidden blade. "I'd like to see you people try to kill someone who can't be killed."

The Jaegers and the other three Rakshasa Demons watched in silence when Solomon cut deep into the palm of his hand with the blade and produced a sizeable amount of blood which, in a matter of seconds, he used to forge his signature rapier from hilt to blade and pressed its sharpened edge against the base of the purple-haired Demon's throat.

"Go ahead. _Try to kill me._ " he dared the Demon, the man staring at him before his grin widened into an evil smile as she lowered his hand and laughed.

"Heh heh, so that's how its gonna be. I have no use for petty fights with those who are arrogant. You people should just sit back and drink wine inside this mansion…" he started to say before he felt a dark presence behind him and he stiffened up, his eyes widening in shock.

The sharpened tip of an ice sword was pressed up against the back of his neck, with Esdeath herself holding the blade with a grin on her face. "Regardless of your achievements, you shouldn't let your guard down."

"Especially with us." said Tatsumi when he manifested Neuntote in a pillar of fire and aimed the spear at the Demon's abdomen, the grand total of blades being aimed right at him rising to three.

"Of course, General. I would never even think of doing so." said the man, Solomon keeping his gaze hardened as he absorbed his blood and sealed up the self-inflicted wound on his hand while Esdeath deconstructed her ice sword and Neuntote was turned into nothingness on orders from Tatsumi.

Solomon stepped back until he stood next to Wave and Kurome while Esdeath and Tatsumi watched the Rakshasa Demon return to his comrades, the two talking to one another low enough so that Bolic or the Demons couldn't hear them.

"He made us come here, even though he already has pawns as powerful as these...he must really want the Path of Peace to remain silent…" muttered Esdeath quietly, Tatsumi slowly nodding his head in agreement.

"We'll talk about this later." he replied before they turned around and walked away with the other Jaegers to enjoy the rest of the party.

Minutes turned to hours and the night seemed to get longer and longer, the bad taste they had all gotten as a result of meeting with Bolic fading away. When the the Moon had finally reached its apex, the party came to a close and everyone returned to their own rooms to drift off into the waiting embrace of sleep. Well, not everybody.

"So now that we've encountered Bolic and seen that the Prime Minister has already sent bodyguards here in the form of the Four Rakshasa Demons, what do you think we should do?" asked Tatsumi as he stood with Esdeath out on the balcony their room offered, the Moon's light illuminating their skin.

"Well, you should know first just who the Four Rakshasa Demons really are." said Esdeath as she leaned against the railing with her back, Tatsumi looking over at her.

He had been wondering if what that Demon with the purple hair had said was true, and that if they really had been able to take down Teigu users with just their bare hands. The thought of people being able to do such a thing astounded him.

"That man, Ibara, the one with the purple hair, was speaking the truth. The Four Rakshasa Demons trained at the famous Kouken Temple, which trains its practitioners in the Imperial Fist style of martial arts. What makes them special is that they've been able to gain complete mastery over their body and can manipulate them at will."

"What do you mean by manipulate?" asked Tatsumi, Esdeath looking into his eyes with a hardened gaze.

"They can grow, extend and twist their bodies in a myriad of ways that can enable them to avoid attacks and strike out at enemies from several different angles."

Tatsumi cringed at the thought of a human being doing something such as that. "That sounds...horrifying."

"That's why they're called Demons, and that's why they're employed as the Prime Minister's personal executioners. Together, they are a force to be reckoned with." said Esdeath, Tatsumi walking away and delving deep in his thoughts to formulate a plan.

It took a few moments, but after going through a ton of possible scenarios and accounting for the eventual arrival of Night Raid, which he knew was going to happen soon, and the Four Rakshasa Demons, he finally figured out what they would do.

"Okay, I've got it. We'll just let Night Raid do all the work."

"What do you mean?" asked Esdeath, Tatsumi returning to her side and wrapping an arm around her shoulders.

"Instead of us doing anything, we'll let Night Raid deal with the Four Rakshasa Demons. And when they do eventually make it to the mansion, we'll engage them of course, but instead of leaving someone to guard Bolic...we could have it to where a certain individual will be able to slip by and take him out for us." he explained with a grin, the plan slowly coming together the more he talked about it.

"So we purposefully let someone from Night Raid slip by and kill Bolic. Who?"

"I have no doubt in my mind that Akame will be the one to try and sneak past us when the fighting starts. She was a former assassin from the Empire, after all." continued Tatsumi. "That way we won't have to risk doing it ourselves and possibly reveal our intentions."

Esdeath lowered her gaze for a moment and thought on the plan, going over the steps and ensuring that it would work. And he was right about Akame as well. A former of the Elite Seven would most definitely be the one suited to killing Bolic. When she came to the conclusion that it indeed would provide them with an easy way to get their task done, she smiled and nodded.

"I'm impressed. If you had stayed with the Empire originally, you probably would've been able to reach the rank of General."

"Thank you, that means a lot from you." replied Tatsumi before they turned away from the night sky and walked towards the bed, their tired bodies taking control of their minds and telling them to rest.

While they fell asleep, the city itself however remained alive, the citizens who preferred the nightlife coming out from their hiding places to roam the streets and conduct their usual business.

Some of these people were a certain group of assassins that gathered on a rooftop close by to Bolic's mansion, their eyes glued to the massive structure.

They stared angrily at the man's home, the building having been constructed off the money accumulated from the less fortunate.

"So that's Bolic's mansion….bastard." snarled Leone as she glared at the building, Najenda crossing her arms and scanning the exterior for any points of entry.

"We'll wait until tomorrow night to begin looking through the city for the secret entrance into Bolic's mansion Gazia's contact informed him about." he said in a low tone, the guitar player himself not present with him since he had business to take care of back at the Revolutionary Army's HQ.

One by one they leaped off the roof of the building to make their way towards the camp they had set up outside the city, with Akame being the last to leave. She stared at the mansion for a few more moments before she turned away and followed her comrades, her mind already drifting ahead to when they would have to undoubtedly fight their way to their goal through a certain person.

And they all knew who it was going to be.

" _We'll be the victors this time around...Tatsumi. You won't stop us from achieving our goals._ "

 **\- The Next Day -**

"At least we don't have to worry about any wanted posters from the Empire out here." said Leone with a grin as she casually walked alongside Mine through one of Kyoroch's busy markets, the sound of shopkeepers trying to sell their products drowning out all other noises.

"The Jaegers might be distributing them now. We can't let our guard down." replied back Mine without turning around, Leone rolling her eyes and sighing.

"Mine, you need to learn to relax. Walking around all tense and such will be like your broadcasting yourself to anyone who could be watching." she said after going up beside her diminutive companion and glancing down at her with a stern expression.

Mine met her gaze and held it for a few seconds before she exhaled and relaxed her shoulders, the strap she used to carry the metal case containing Pumpkin and its other parts becoming slack.

"Yeah...I guess your right."

They continued making their way through the bustling crowd, a common pattern that they noticed being that every person they passed by or saw had a smile on their faces. Leone guessed it was because of the religion that had spread like wildfire through the city's populace and that the Empire's influence wasn't as prominent in other portions of the Empire..

" _If only the people were like this back at the capital._ " thought Leone sadly before Mine skipped her way up some stairs ahead of them and looked back over her shoulder.

"Let's head over to the eastern edge of the city now so we don't get near the central are where Tat-I mean, the Jaegers, are policing." she said, catching herself near the end when she almost said _that_ name.

"Yeah, especially since Lubbock ever-so graciously volunteered to go scan that area around the Church."

Currently at that moment, Lubbock himself with a hooded cloak draped over his usual attire was walking through a less-crowded street closer to the center of the city with a flask of water in hand.

"Jeez, what a labyrinthine town-scape...Well, I guess it's nice to have this many people, since it's easier to blend in and search." he muttered to himself after taking a drink.

" _Luckily, my name and face aren't known, so I'll gather tons of data and score some points for Miss Najenda._ " he thought with a smirk as he shoved his flash into his pocket and inched his way past a group of people.

Up above, on one of the overlooking buildings, two figures that stood out from all the rest smiled as they observed him from their vantage point without his knowledge. They had been pursuing him for a couple of minutes now, and just from how he was walking they could tell that something was amiss.

"Hey, Sten. Don't you think he's moving like he's surveying the area?" asked the girl, the man with the long black beard standing next to her chuckling.

"Indeed. My instincts are screaming that he is an enemy. That's the movement of one who's braved many a battle. It seems he's being careful about it, but I can tell." replied Sten, the girl licking her lips with an evil grin.

"So, he's a Night Raid member then...let's kill him."

"No, Mez...call it the freeing of his soul."


	10. Moves and Countermoves

A/N The Rakshasa Demons have made their entrance, and Lubbock is gonna have a fun time. Yay. However, even though this does follow the manga (anime is some regards too) closely, it's not gonna turn out the same. I'm sure as hell gonna make sure it doesn't end up like that.

* * *

 **Chapter 9 - Moves and Countermoves**

 **\- Kyoroch Graveyard -**

"According to our data, there should be an underground passageway passing beneath this graveyard, which leaves from the Church to Bolic's mansion." said one of the two Revolutionary Army spies with Akame underneath one of the graveyard's many trees.

She was chowing down hungrily on a large piece of meat, so she was unable to respond until she had swallowed what was already in her mouth. Once all remnants of the food were gone, she cleared her throat and set her sights on the row upon row of gravestones that populated the graveyard.

"If we could find out the location of the passageway's entrance, we could go to Bolic's mansion's basement that way."

A little ways off from where they were, hiding behind one of the graveyard's many mausoleums, was the Rakshasa Demon named Ibara. He was grinning from ear to ear as he got himself ready to interrupt his enemy's discussion, and he could hardly contain himself.

" _I'm going to enjoy killing you, Akame._ " he thought as he clenched his fists, popping every one of his fingers as a result.

All of a sudden, before he could leap out from cover, another presence made itself known to the Demon, and he slowly turned around with a look of confusion on his face. What he saw was a visitor who's outfit stood out greatly with the common attire people in the region wear.

"Who are you?" he asked warily, the visitor saying nothing.

Ibara's muscles tensed up in preparation for a possible fight with the visitor. Out of nowhere the color silver flashed before his eyes and he flinched, his mind unsure of what just happened. He gasped when a deep cut appeared at the base of his neck, blood gushing out from the severed arteries and quickly covering his bare chest.

His hands grappled to his throat to try and stop the flow of blood pouring out and he fell to his knees, his eyes glaring at the visitor who had procured the blade.

"W-Why...you…!" he stuttered with a ragged breath before he fell over and struck the grass with his forehead, a large pool of blood beginning to accumulate around his head.

Akame perked up a little when she thought she felt something else other then herself and the two spies she was with, but after a few seconds of silently waiting she shrugged and assumed that it was nothing.

" _Must've been a bird._ "

 **\- Kyoroch Central District -**

" _Shit! How did they see through me?_ " thought Lubbock frantically ashes reeled himself along one of Cross Tail's threads through the now empty streets of Kyoroch.

Hot on his tail were the two Rakshasa Demons that had suddenly attack them, and no matter what kind of evasive moves he performed they remained right behind him. They were definitely skilled, and he was worried that he would be unable to escape without a fight.

Mez grinned evilly as she reared her left arm back, the bones cracking several times before she threw her arm forward and extended it over a great length, reaching Lubbock easily even though they were at least over several meters apart from one another. Her hand's outstretched fingers struck him in the ribcage underneath his left armpit, knocking the wind out of him and causing blood to fly out from his mouth.

Lubbock struck the ground hard and slid for a few feet before coming to a stop, Mez and Sten stopping their sprinting to observe their fallen prey. Mez strolled over ands frowned in disappointment when she pressed a finger to his neck and felt no pulse whatsoever, meaning he had died from that one blow.

"This guy's heart already stopped. How weak!" she said with a huff, Sten crossing his arms when she ran off down the street to find more prey.

Thankfully the two Demon's did not check Lubbock's body any further because, in truth, he was actually still alive. He wasn't reputed as the best actor in Night Raid for nothing.

"Mez...sure is late." said Sten as he gazed over his shoulder at Bolic's mansion in the distance.

" _No, not "Sure is late…" you damn geezer! Hurry up and leave! Just how long am I supposed to play dead?!_ " thought Lubbock anxiously as time continued to pass by painfully slow.

He was able to survive te fatal blow thanks to the string armor he had wrapped around his body beforehand, and to make himself appear dead he had put Cross Tail's threads into his body and bound his blood vessels. It had been a risky move, but so far it was paying off.

" _If it came to a fight, then there's a chance that the Jaegers would arrive as well. I'd like to sneak by like this at all costs._ "

Lubbock continued to monitor his surroundings with his other senses, something he had gotten quite good at, until he heard the sound of running come closer and closer to his location, meaning that female Rakshasa Demon had returned.

"Here, Sten. She's coming your way. I'll give you the prey this time!" exclaimed Mez as she chased a young girl, probably just coming out of her teens, right towards her comrade.

Sten grinned evilly and the young girl skid to a halt a few feet away from him, squealing in terror as the large man slowly walked towards her with his arms crossed. She looked back for a way to escape but found out that Mez was standing behind her with her hands on her hips. She was trapped with no way out.

" _I guess that's a girl from the spy team. These guys are making this place their hunting ground because it's an alleyway and no one else is around._ " thought Lubbock before he cracked open one of his eyes to get a glimpse of the girl, quickly closing it a second later to maintain his act. " _I'm sorry, but I can't help you. As long as you're a spy...you should've been prepared for this to happen._ "

Sten now was towering over the girl, his malicious smile causing her to quiver in fear. "You must be another lost child wandering this transient world. Do not be afraid, I shall free that soul of yours. Be happy."

In a flash the Demon rammed the palm of his hand into the girl's throat and picked her up off the ground, slowly choking the life out of her. Tears started to stream down her cheeks as she tried to pry his fingers from around her neck and helplessly kicked her legs this way and that, her vision starting to fill up with blinking lights with each passing second.

"P-Please...Hel…" she gasped, her breaths getting shorter and quicker the tighter Sten's grip got.

Sten could feel her end was near, and he was about to finish her off by snapping her neck before his eyes widened and he stuck out his other hand, catching a knife aimed at his throat in between his index and middle fingers.

"Mez, did you see-"

He stopped mid-sentence when he heard a vicious snapping noise echo from behind him, the hairs on the back of his neck immediately standing on end when his sixth sense kicked in. He looked back over his shoulder and visibly stiffened up when he saw Mez's lifeless body, her head twisted around at least a hundred and twenty degrees and her neck cut open, collapse to the ground. Her neck had been easily broken and the cut had been deep enough to puncture her Aorta, ensuring that she would die.

The person who had killed her was standing right behind her corpse with a blood-stained knife and a smile that caused Sten's anger to explode inside him.

"Catch me if you can."

Sten snarled angrily as he let go of the girl he was previously choking and gave chase after his comrade's killer, leaving her alone with the seemingly dead Lubbock.

He waited for a few more seconds, listening to the young girl cough and hack, to make sure that the Rakshasa Demon was indeed gone before he opened his eyes and pushed himself up off the ground. His sudden resurrection from the dead made the girl squeal again, but he quickly soothed her by going over to her and wrapping an arm around her.

"It's fine, I was playing dead. Are you okay?" asked Lubbock as he helped her to her feet, the girl dusting herself off and coughing again.

"Y-Yeah...it just hurts to talk." she replied whilst rubbing her tender throat.

Lubbock nodded before he motioned down the road away from where they were, saying, "You better get out of here in case he comes back."

She nodded and thanked him again before she ran off, Lubbock watching her go with a concerned expression when his mind drifted back to the unknown voice he had heard after Mez had been killed. He looked back down the road in the direction he heard Sten run and frowned, the identity of the person who had managed to sneak up on them alluding him.

" _I'll tell Najenda about this later. Right now I need to find Mine and Leone._ "

Several streets down from where Mez had been brutally killed, Sten blinked a few times before he fell onto his back with a heavy thud and uttered his final breath, his blood forming a pool around him as a result of the huge gash made into the base of his neck that had severed all of his major arteries.

"Rest easy, for as you put it, I have freed your soul." spoke the killer, the same person who had done in Mez. "Three down...one to go."

 **\- Revolutionary Spy Rendezvous Point -**

 **\- Fifteen Minutes Later -**

There were five of them there sitting on some rubble within the broken down basement of the building on the outskirts of Kyoroch they had chosen to act as their meeting point. It was perfect for their purposes since it was out of the way and inconspicuous enough to be overlooked.

"Now that we have enough data, we should return back to Night Raid." said one of the spies as he stood up and turned towards the exit down at the opposite end of the room.

All of a sudden the door was kicked in with such force it was reduced to splinters, the wooden projectiles shooting past the spies and striking the wall behind them.

"So this is the hideout of the spies. _Found_ you." said the person who had so barbarically made her entrance with a smile on her face once the dust settled.

Her name was Suzuka, and she was currently the last Rakshasa Demon left alive within the city...a fact she has yet to find out.

"Oh, my. There doesn't seem to be anyone strong in here." she said in utter disappointment, the spies gulping nervously when she stepped towards them with her hands on her hips.

"Actually...there is."

Suzuka's eyes widened and she whirled around in shock, a person she neither knew or recognized entering the room through the busted door and stopping several yards away from her. She hadn't sensed the intrusion, and she tensed up in preparation for a fight.

"Are you from the Empire?" asked Suzuka, the person lowering his head slightly and sighing heavily.

"That's classified. But, unfortunately for you, I _am_ the person who has killed your allies. You are the last Rakshasa Demon alive."

Suzuka's heart skipped a beat and her skin lost a little color. The others were dead? Sten, Mez and Ibara...all _dead_? There was no way. The Four Rakshasa Demons are the Prime Minister's personal executioners, elite fighters who have been able to take down Teigu users without even using one themselves.

"You're bluffing. There's no way someone like you could've taken them down." she said with a scoff, her sixth sense telling her that this person wasn't really much of a threat.

"Well, you know how the saying goes…looks can be deceiving."

Suzuka narrowed her eyes for a fraction of a second before she threw her arm out at him, her target being the throat. An easy kill, textbook execution. She highly doubted that this person would be able to avoid it.

She was wrong.

It all happened so fast, in a matter of moments. The figure was there one moment, then was gone in the next. The unknown intruder produced a knife out of nowhere and with a single slash, her entire arm from the elbow down was chopped off. Before Suzuka could say or do anything else aside from scream as a result of her arm getting cut off, the figure covered the distance between them in the blink of an eye and rammed the knife through her throat.

She gasped and stared right into her killer's eyes, the image burning itself into her mind while blood began to gush out from the wound and run down her neck and chest.

"Go to sleep…" said the figure in almost a whisper before Suzuka grunted when the knife was pulled out through the side of her neck, partially severing it and putting the final nail into her coffin. She whimpered and wobbled a bit, her legs still trying to support her weight, before finally she collapsed onto the ground, the wound killing her in under a minute.

"Now then…" The figure's gaze rose up from Suzuka's corpse to the Revolutionary Army spies still standing in the room. "Since you all are witnesses...I'm going to have to kill you too."

 **\- Church of the Path of Peace -**

 **\- Thirty Minutes Later -**

"So this is where members of the Path of Peace come to worship." said Tatsumi in awe of the large church he and Esdeath had come across whilst on their patrol route through the city.

It wasn't as grandiose as the Imperial Palace back in the capital, but it definitely took the top spot for being one of the largest and most well-crafted buildings within Kyoroch.

"Yes, indeed it is."

The two Jaegers turned around quickly and watched as a man with long white hair and priest-like clothing approach them with a group of men and women dressed in white behind him.

"You...you're the Lord, I presume? The founder of the Path of Peace?" asked Esdeath as she took her hand off her rapier, the man nodding.

"Yes, that is I."

Tatsumi looked through the ranks of his followers and found that Bolic wasn't among them, which didn't really surprise him much considering his character and personality. He was probably still back in his mansion enjoying himself while they did all the hard work by patrolling the city and keeping a look out for Night Raid.

The Lord looked at Tatsumi and Esdeath for a few seconds, examining them and the expressions they each wore, before he himself frowned, something obviously concerning him.

"I can clearly see that you two are bound by the red thread of fate, but...there seems to be something troubling the both of you."

Esdeath's eyes widened in surprise and she glanced up at Tatsumi, who gave her the same look of surprise and shrugged.

"Please, allow me to help." pleaded the Lord, Tatsumi meeting his eyes and sighing heavily.

"Tatsumi, are you sure?" questioned Esdeath softly when she realized what he planned on doing just off his face alone, Tatsumi nodding once.

"There is something, actually. Although, I would prefer if we talk in private."

"Of course. Come with me." replied the Lord as he strode past them and opened the doors to the Church and beckoned them inside, his entourage remaining outside while Tatsumi and Esdeath followed him.

He closed the heavy wooden doors and led them to the large altar beneath the feet of the massive stone statue that served as one of the religious symbols for the Path of Peace. Tatsumi of course recognized it since it was the exact same figure depicted on the small wooden talisman his village elder had given to him when he had first left.

"Now, tell me what conflicts you." asked the Lord after turning to face Tatsumi and Esdeath.

"Well, where do I start…" mumbled Tatsumi as he rubbed his chin, unsure of what to say first to the religious leader. "You do know why we are here, correct?"

"Not exactly, no." replied the Lord, Esdeath crossing her arms and staring at him with a soft look.

"We're here to protect your aide, Bolic." she said, the Lord giving her a confused look.

"Why would he need protecting?"

"He's not who he says he is. He's a spy sent here by the Empire, and our job is the protect him because there are plans made by a faction of the Revolutionary Army called Night Raid to assassinate him." explained Tatsumi, the Lord's eyes widening in shock as a result of being presented with the new information.

"A spy? For what reason?"

"We believe that your religion was planning an insurrection. Is that true?" asked Esdeath.

The Lord remained silent and lowered his gaze, his expression morphing from shock to regret. It seemed that what she had said had been true after all, and that the cat was out of the bag now.

"Indeed...I didn't want it to happen, and I still don't want it to." he replied, his eyes shifting to Esdeath again. "And I suppose now that I told you, you're going to have to kill me?"

Esdeath shook her head, and to ease some of the Lord's stress, she removed her rapier's sheath from her belt and placed it on the ground next to her to show that she meant no ill will. "No, of course not."

"Actually, we were planning on allowing Bolic to be killed so that you would continue on and rebel against the Empire." revealed Tatsumi, the Lord becoming surprised once again. "You see...we ourselves plan on killing the Prime Minister ourselves."

"A coup d'etat, essentially." said Esdeath to put it into simpler terms.

The Lord slowly nod his head and recovered his exposure, his gaze going from her and back to Tatsumi. "Why?"

"My feelings about the situation are like yours. I don't want anyone else dying because of the corrupt Empire and the people controlling it, namely the Prime Minister." said Tatsumi with a serious tone, the Lord slowly nodding before he raised a hand up and pondered on the situation for a few moments.

"And you're conflicted because you don't know how your team members will react...right?"

Tatsumi remained silent and closed his eyes to answer his question, the Lord moving from him to Esdeath and seeing the same reaction come from her. They had already decided for themselves to commit to killing the Prime Minister, but how would the other Jaegers react? Wave would probably be swayed easily enough, Bols and Run were also a possibility, Solomon wouldn't care either way, and Chelsea would be all for it, but Kurome...she might end up turning against them.

The Lord smiled and he approached the two of them, placing a hand on one of their shoulders each. "Do what you both think is right."

"What?" asked Esdeath.

"You can either tell them or not, it's up to you. All I can say is for you to follow your hearts." said the Lord as he removed his hands from their shoulders and stepped back. "And, if by some chance, your attempt goes awry...you may return here. I will gladly offer sanctuary for you under protection from the church."

"You would do that for us? We're basically enemies." asked Esdeath, the Lord nodding.

"I don't see enemies before me, only friends. Now go on back to your team and think about what I said."

Tatsumi smiled and he walked back with Esdeath towards the doors of the church, the Lord right behind them. As soon as the doors were opened, however, they were immediately met by Wave with a concerned expression on his face.

"Wave? What's wrong?" asked Esdeath, Wave shoving one hand into his pocket while he ran the other through his hair anxiously.

"You're not gonna like this Captain, but...it's the Four Rakshasa Demons."

"What about them?"

"They're dead. All four of them. You know what this means, right?"

Esdeath glanced at Tatsumi and he developed a hardened look, his fists tightening. "They're here. It's Night Raid."

 **\- Night Raid Kyoroch Hideout -**

"You're kidding me, right?"

Lubbock shook his head and flinched when Susanoo finished wrapping the bandages around his waist where he had been hit by Mez earlier. "No, I'm dead serious. Someone else attacked the two Rakshasa Demons that were with me and killed one of them before luring away the other."

"Then it's safe to assume that the other three were killed by the same individual too."

"Gazia!" exclaimed Leone with a grin when their newest member entered the small room and removed his straw hat, waving at her afterwards.

"So, you got whatever business you had to do done?" asked Mine, Gazia nodding.

"Indeed. Now I'm here and ready to help with dealing with the Jaegers." he replied, Lubbock looking back and resting a hand on his knee.

"Well, you pretty much already know what all's gone on while you were gone. The Four Rakshasa Demons, the Prime Minister's personal executioners, were killed by the same person whom we have no information about whatsoever."

Gazia pulled up a chair and rested Isterio in his lap before proceeding to tune the instrument and begin to play it, its soothing music filling up the room and brightening the atmosphere. "That certainly is interesting. This person must've been powerful if he or she was able to take down all of the Rakshasa Demons."

"I just have one concern though…" said Najenda as she pulled out a cigarette and lit it. "Is this person a friend or a foe?"

"Like I said, I don't know." replied Lubbock.

"It's safe to assume that they could be an ally and share resentment to the Empire, but we should still tread carefully." stated Akame, the entire group agreeing with her assessment.

 **\- Kyoroch Outskirts -**

"All four of the Demons were killed?"

"Yes, all four."

"Good...now Bolic's the only one left."


	11. Kill the Spy

A/N Dun dun dun, seems there are more players then just the Jaegers and Night Raid. And who could the person who managed to defeat all four Rakshasa Demons be? All will be answered in time, my friends. Also, the new upload schedule will be a new chapter every 4 days. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 10 - Kill the Spy**

Because the Jaegers had confirmed the presence of Night Raid, they raised their alert level to an all-time high, especially since the Four Rakshasa Demons are now gone. On the other hand, because many of the Revolutionary Army's spies sent to Kyoroch to assist Night Raid were killed, they haven't been able to move as efficiently. For these reasons, this state of stalemate continued for two whole weeks.

However, unbeknownst to the Jaegers...it hadn't been Night Raid to kill the Four Rakshasa Demons at all.

And now, the only person left was Bolic, who under orders by Esdeath was confined to the interior of his mansion so that he would remain safe. She and Tatsumi knew though that Night Raid would eventually find a way inside, so it was only a matter of time until they suddenly appeared within the property.

Esdeath herself was waiting in the entrance hall of Bolic's mansion, Tatsumi standing right beside her while the rest of the Jaegers were spread out through the rest of the property.

"Are you ready?" she asked with a light smile, Tatsumi nodding as he grasped Incursio's key tightly.

"Of course." he replied, the armor consuming him a second later. "You know the plan right?"

"Yes. Let them come."

Outside in the mansion grounds, near one of the far corners of the wall that surrounded the mansion, the dirt and grass shook and trembled before it collapsed, forming a round sinkhole that allowed moonlight to shoot in.

"Alright, we're through." said Leone as she hunched down and peeked out through the opening, Susanoo, Gazia and Najenda right behind her.

"We can now begin our operation." stated Najenda as she stretched out her prosthetic arm's fingers and got ready with Susanoo, Gazia preparing his guitar and Leone transforming into her animal state.

 **\- Night Raid Kyoroch Hideout -**

 **\- Four Hours Earlier -**

"Boss, don't you think they've already anticipated an attack from below?" asked Mine, Susanoo glancing over at her and crossing his arms.

"Objectively speaking, they must already consider it a possibility."

"Of course." said Gazia as he ran his hand over the strings of his guitar. "But that's why we'll split up into two teams."

"First, a diversion team from underground. They will charge the front head on, creating a great commotion and attracting the attention of our enemy. Susanoo, Leone, Gazia and I will be on this team." explained Najenda as she pressed her finger to the front of the outline of Bolic's mansion on the paper resting before her. "Since it's a team that needs to be defensive, all the members have great defense or a high recovery rate."

It seemed like a solid plan so far, and the other Night Raid members who weren't included in the first team were already starting to figure out what their role would be in the upcoming battle. While the diversionary team would draw the attention of the Jaegers and lead them on a rabbit chase, a secondary team would come in and, through the chaos, infiltrate the mansion and assassinate Bolic.

There was only one thing missing through, the factor they all knew would come into play...but the one they all refrained from speaking of.

"And what of Tatsumi…?" asked Akame quietly, the assassin fixing her gaze on Najenda and Gazia.

"Our target is Bolic. If Tatsumi gets in the way, take care of him." was her only response, Akame nodding.

The whole group knew that this attack was a dangerous and aggressive move that had to be made before the Lord of the Path of Peace was assassinated. Even if the enemy is on guard more so than ever before, and one of their former friends was now a member, there was no other choice. Striving for the success of this mission that will be vital to the revolution, each member made their resolution.

"Bolic will be killed...no matter what."

 **\- Present Time -**

Two armed guards allied with Bolic were patrolling the perimeter of the mansion grounds, just minding their own business, before they stopped when they heard something peculiar coming from the small grouping of trees beside them.

It was guitar music.

They brought around their rifles and faced the direction the sweet music was coming from, their eyes narrowed. Out from behind one of the trees emerged a figure, his appearance masked by the shadows, and before they could identify him he ran his fingers over his guitar's strings and played a single note.

"Reaper's Tarantella."

He strummed his guitar a second time and as soon as the visible, almost energy-like sound waves passed over and through them, the guards grunted and gasped harshly before collapsing to the ground with a hand clutching their chests.

"What did you do to them?" asked Leone with a grin as she walked out from behind another tree with Gazia, Susanoo and Najenda.

The guitar player chuckled dryly as he walked up to one of the fallen guards and prodded his side with his boot, checking to make sure that he was dead. "The Reaper's Tarantella, a tune that creates sound waves powerful enough to cause arteries to rupture, or in this case...can make a person's heart explode."

Leone's grin vanished in an instant and she shivered at the thought of someone's heart bursting, the gruesome deaths of the guards causing even Najenda to grimace.

"Come one, the entrance is just ahead." she said after pushing away the image of the dead guards and led the group up the lawn and to the front doors of Bolic's mansion.

They were diving into unknown territory and had no idea what they were getting into. But this was their job as the diversionary team, plans were simply out of the question. And now that they were here, ready to go...it was time to make some noise.

Susanoo reared back and busted down the doors with his staff, the rest of the group rushing inside and expecting a large group of enemies to deal with. Instead, they got the complete opposite. They came to an abrupt halt upon reaching the middle of the entrance hall and stared intensely at the person standing in their way at the foot of the staircase leading to the second floor. It was Tatsumi with Incursio already active and his arms crossed. He was glaring viciously at them, his cross-slit pupils blazing with the unrivaled power of the very same Danger Beast the armor was forged from.

"Hey, guys. Nice to see you again." he said, Leone clenching her fists and baring her fangs. "And I'm sorry to say this, but, I'm gonna have to stop you here."

"You bastard…" snarled Gazia as he prepared to play Isterio and kill him right here and now.

All of a sudden another presence, one much darker and more evil then Tatsumi's, appeared behind them and Najenda whirled around, her expression changing from anger to terror when the entrance was blocked by a huge wall of solid ice.

She swallowed her fear and watched with a stone-cold gaze as Esdeath emerged from behind one of the many pillars in the entrance hall and stand before the wall of ice, a cocky grin on her face.

"We meet again, Najenda." she said before drawing her rapier and taking a stance, her eyes focused right on her old comrade. "Ready for round two?"

Susanoo tapped her on the shoulder and Najenda glanced back at Tatsumi, who by now had manifested Neuntote in his right hand and readied himself. They were surrounded by two of the strongest fighters within the Jaegers, and they still had no idea where the rest of their enemy was within the large mansion.

"Let it begin!" announced Esdeath before, seemingly from the air itself, Wave dropped down from above within Grand Chariot and charged right at them. He blew past Susanoo and Leone at break-neck speed and tackled Gazia, picking him up and smashing him through an adjacent wall into another room.

As soon as they vanished within the plume of smoke that was born because of the wall's destruction Tatsumi and Esdeath assaulted the remaining Night Raid members simultaneously, with Susanoo and Najenda clashing with the General and Leon fending off her former friend with all of her strength.

While Esdeath parried and side-stepped Susanoo's staff, her smile grew wider and wider in anticipation of the real fight to come after this small skirmish was over.

" _You may think you're one step ahead of us, Najenda, but in fact...you're just doing my work for me. Now hurry up and reveal the rest of your forces!_ "

Several miles out from the mansion and high above the city, an air manta carrying the remaining members of Night Raid that were assigned to come in during the chaos riding atop its back. They had no idea that their enemy already knew they would be coming.

"Alright! We'll charge in through the roof and head straight for Bolic!" said Lubbock eagerly as he spotted the mansion in the distance, Akame grasping Murasame tightly while Mine finished attaching Pumpkin's long-barrel attachment.

"Mine, once we're almost there, use Pumpkin to blast a good-sized hole!"

"I know, I'm ready to go!" she replied with a grin as she brought up the rifle and aimed directly at the domed roof of the mansion, its size growing the closer they got.

Before she could pull the trigger however she spotted a darkened figure standing atop the roof of the mansion and squinted to try and make it out. Said figure grinned evilly when he spotted the air manta in the distance and he hunched over, the skin on his back beginning to split apart and allow his blood to flow out and create several tendrils that continued to expand and grow.

"Bad move, Night Raid."

"Look out!" shouted Mine before she pulled the trigger and fired a beam of spirit energy that cut right through one of the massive tendrils of blood that shot up at them from below, the air manta diving to the right after a quick command from Lubbock.

"The hell are those?!" he shouted before another tentacle emerged from behind him and swung out at the Danger Beast, Akame quickly reacting by using her sword to chop off a good portion of it. "And is that *blood?!"

Before they could do anything else a third tendril of blood shot through the air manta's body and fatally injured it, the three assassins falling over and holding onto its skin for dear life as the tendril dragged it out of the sky and tossed it towards the backyard garden the mansion possessed. Thinking quickly Lubbock sent out several threads of Cross Tail and grabbed onto Akame and Mine, managing to pull themselves away from the dead air manta before it crashed into the ground and land safely on the ground after swinging around off a tree.

They had barely any time to rest because their unknown attacker dropped down from the roof and landed softly several yards away from them, the tendrils of blood emerging from his back shrinking slightly.

"Greetings. Sorry about your ride by the way." said Solomon with a sneer as he cracked his neck and knuckles, Akame staring him down with an emotionless look on her face.

He had decided to stop wearing his hoodie, shirt and facemask entirely and simply don his baggy pants and boots while remaining shirtless, showing off the multitude of tattoos across his body.

Suddenly Akame's usually cold exterior cracked slightly when from behind Solomon emerged her younger sister Kurome, her sword, Yatsufusa, already unsheathed and glowing with a dark purple aura. Natala followed afterwards and Kurome smiled when she saw Akame standing at the front of the group.

"Hi big sis. It's nice to see you again." she said happily, Akame glaring at her before a huge explosion of dust and wood emerged from the side of the mansion, Gazia shooting outward and striking the ground once before rolling up to them.

He quickly leaped up and recovered Isterio, Lubbock joining him when Wave emerged from the newly created hole his abrupt exit had created with Silber in hand.

"It seems they knew you were coming?" asked Gazia when he glanced over at Solomon and Kurome.

"Yeah. Care to lend a hand and help us out?" asked Mine, Gazia smirking as he let Lubbock interchange with him so he could fight Solomon.

When they switched spots Mine turned around and set her gaze on the armored Wave, who crossed his arms and glared at them from behind the helmet of Grand Chariot. "Lubbock, I'll help you out with this guy."

"Gotcha. He uses an armor similar to Incursio, so be careful." informed Lubbock while Mine aimed Pumpkin at Wave and looked down the iron sights, Akame and Gazia standing side by side with their Teigus at the ready.

Before either side could make a move, Night Raid's current situation got even worse when another dust plume emerged from the mansion and out from the second floor shout out Susanoo, Najenda and Leone, who were already in a pretty miserable state themselves.

"Boss!" exclaimed Gazia when the group landed beside them, Mine and Lubbock staring back in horror at the large gash present in Leone's gut.

She noticed the expressions on their faces and coughed a few times before grinning, saying, "I'm fine, really. Just give me a minute to recover."

"We don't have a minute…" muttered Susanoo with a scowl as he pointed up to the mansion roof, the others following the angle of his finger and tensing up when Esdeath and Tatsumi appeared at the edge without a scratch on them.

Esdeath grinned as she looked down upon the surrounded assassins from above, the sight before her one she had been waiting for since the very creation of the Jaegers. She looked over at Tatsumi softened up slightly when she noticed the tinge of regret in his eyes, but he quickly locked it away and grasped Neuntote tightly with his right hand.

"Seems like the entirety of Night Raid is here. Wonderful!" said Esdeath gleefully, Tatsumi taking a few seconds to count every single member and double check to make sure they were all indeed present.

"This is all of them. They even picked up that guy with the guitar that allowed them to escape last time." he said as he pointed at Gazia with his spear, Esdeath narrowing her eyes and chuckling.

"It doesn't matter how many new members they receive, they'll be cut down either way."

They stepped off the roof edge together and landed right beside Wave, completing the encirclement around Night Raid and cutting off any chance of escape they had. Najenda cursed under her breath at just how bad things had gotten now and she tried to think of a way to get out of it.

"What do we do now Boss?" asked Leone after her wound finished healing, Najenda biting her lip.

Retreat was completely out of the question, they had a mission to accomplish. Bolic needed to be assassinated so that the Path of Peace could commence with their uprising and set the stage for the push toward the capital alongside the Western Nations and the Revolutionary Army. Their original plan though had failed, and she thanked god when she realized that some of the Jaegers weren't present, but they still had to deal with Tatsumi and Esdeath.

And Gazia using his Teigu to paralyze them again would probably fail as well since it had already been done once before and she had no doubt in her mind that her former colleague had prepared for it. She clenched her fists in frustration and sighed heavily.

"There's only one thing we can do…" she muttered before glancing up at Gazia and nodding.

The guitarist returned the gesture and glared back at Solomon, his fingers changing their positions across Isterio's strings.

"Immortal Virtuoso's Anthem!" he shouted before he played a different tune with Isterio, a green light suddenly encompassing his entire body.

In a flash he was right on top of Solomon, attacking him with a series of punches and kicks that mixed in the use of his Teigu as a weapon. From there the entire garden erupted into chaos, with Akame attacking her sister, Lubbock and Mine engaging Wave, Leone fighting Tatsumi and Najenda with Susanoo at her side taking on Esdeath.

Meanwhile, inside the comforts of the mansion on the top floor, within Bolic's personal chambers, the man himself was sitting atop his throne with a smirk on his face as he listened to the battle outside escalate in a matter of seconds.

He thought to himself, "*The Four Rakshasa Demons may have been killed, but the Jaegers are more than a match for Night Raid!"

He leaned back and crossed over his legs while whistling lightly to himself, intending to pass by the time until the Jaegers had taken care of Night Raid. All of a sudden he heard a knock come from the doors to his chambers and he straightened up to make himself look more presentable for whoever was outside.

"Enter!" he proclaimed, the double doors pushing inward and a figure walking in with his hands behind his back.

"Who might you be?" asked Bolic, the figure stopping and holding his head up.

The figure glared at him with an emotionless expression and stood perfectly still, Bolic beginning to wonder about the person's identity and his reason for coming here. Then he remembered that the entire compound had been on lockdown as ordered by Esdeath, and he gulped nervously.

"I've been known by many names, I've been to many places...and I've killed a lot of people, including those people known as Demons." said the figure blankly, Bolic's nervousness starting to morph into terror. "And you, Bolic, have been targeted as my next victim."

The figure removed his hands from out behind his back, showing Bolic that he had a knife in each hand, their blades still coaked with dried blood from the dead Rakshasa Demons. Bolic's grin dropped and his worst fears became realized when the man began to walk towards him, the knives at his side.

"H-Hey let's t-talk this out! I'll give you anything! Money? P-Power?!" stammered Bolic frantically as the figure drew closer and closer to him, his pleas falling on deaf ears. "P-Please! Don't kill me!"

Back outside the Jaegers and Night Raid were at eachother's throats, the garden having been transformed into a war-torn battleground as a result of the two opposing forces going all out. The assassins of Night Raid were doing everything in their power to distract the Jaegers long enough for Akame to get past and kill their target, but with every attempt came failure since either Tatsumi or Esdeath stopped her.

The duo were once again proving to be an unstoppable force, but their enemy had no idea that they were about to let them have that one ray of sunshine they had been hoping for. After Esdeath blocked a swing at her head from Susanoo with an ice shard she managed a quick glance over at Tatsumi and nodded, Tatsumi looking back and returning the gesture.

"Sorry Sis, but play time's over." he said before he sidestepped Leone's swipe and grabbed her wrist, the lioness growling at him before he flipped her over his head and brought around Neuntote with his other.

Everyone in the courtyard heard Leone scream out in pain when Tatsumi impaled her through the gut with the red spear, pinning her to the ground and enabling him to focus on helping Esdeath. Gazia had heard the scream and in a fit of rage he focused all of his energy into playing the Reaper's Tarantella, directing the sound waves straight at Solomon.

The Jaeger grunted and collapsed to his knees when he felt every single one of his arteries burst alongside his heart, Gazia grinning evilly from behind his scarf. However the expression quickly vanished when Solomon laughed and wiped away the blood pouring down his chin, his phoenix blood immediately getting to work at regenerating the damaged veins and arteries while his heart instantly repaired itself.

"Sorry, but something like that can't kill me. It's gonna take a *whole lot more to kill me." said Solomon as he stood up to his full height and cracked his neck, Gazia growling in frustration and confusion as to how the man could've possibly survived the certain-kill technique.

" _It has to have something to do with his Teigu, it has to!_ "

Across the garden Lubbock and Mine were also having a tough time dealing with Wave, who in the course of their battle had managed to completely overpower and even dodge MIne's attacks with Pumpkin, the two assassins coming to the conclusion that their opponent was like a force of nature. Close by to where they were Akame and Kurome were going head to head with their blades, with the little sister having an advantage over the big sister considering she had Natala and some of her other puppets active as well.

As the fight dragged on Akame began to realize that if this kept going on their chances at killing Bolic and complete the mission were becoming thinner and thinner, so as she dodged and parried Kurome's blade with Murasame she always kept an eye out for the one opportunity to break away and enter the mansion. And when she noticed Tatsumi incapacitate Leone and leave to join Esdeath, even though her desire to help her fallen comrade was strong, she made her move.

She ducked under Yatsufusa when Kurome swung out at her neck and darted away, her eyes set on the hole Wave had created earlier as a result of launching Gazia through the wall.

"She's going after Bolic!" announced Kurome, Tatsumi and Esdeath looking over their shoulders while the midst of their fight to watch Akame shoot through the hole.

"On it!" yelled Tatsumi as he broke away from her side and followed Akame into the mansion, Esdeath grinning slightly before she returned her attention to Najenda and Susanoo and unleashed a swarm of icicles, the Teigu spinning his staff around to destroy them before they even got close.

In a split second Esdeath was right in front of him with her hand planted firmly on his face, his scowl morphing into total shock while her grin only grew wider. "Freeze."

She flew past Susanoo, his body instantly becoming encased with ice and rooting him to the spot. Najenda stood alone a few yards away with a look of horror painted across her face at the sight of her Teigu now frozen in place, Esdeath right beside him with her rapier at her side and her cocky grin still present.

" _How pathetic...thinking I could take her on. I've become weaker, and Esdeath has definitely grown stronger. She's even more powerful than she was when I was with the Empire!_ " thought Najenda with a growl before she closed her eyes and raised her right arm up, the fingers outstretched. " _I'm in no place to keep saving this. I have to use it now!_ "

"Magatama Manifestation!"

Esdeath's was taken for a surprise when the wind instantly picked up around Najenda, a bright yellow aura emerging from within her that quickly shot out as multiple beams and struck Susanoo's frozen body. She leaped away when an enormous amount of power began to emerge from the Teigu and she glanced back at Najenda, the look on her face telling her that this was their Trump Card.

"Najenda, you-!"

"You should learn not to underestimate us." she said with a heavy breath before, with a huge crash, Susanoo broke free of the ice block that had trapped him, his body now completely different then before.

His hair had turned white, his horns were now black, and a large metal disk now levitated a few inches behind his back. And he was seriously pissed off now, with his eyes boiling with the power of a thousand suns. Esdeath's shock vanished and was replaced with pure giddiness at the sight of his empowered form, her heart starting to race at the thought of fighting him now.

As Najenda collapsed onto the ground, Susanoo ran at her full speed and threw a fist right at her head followed by several other punches and kicks the General had to dodge and block.

"Impressive!" said Esdeath as she leaned back to avoid a roundhouse kick from the Teigu. "But that won't be enough to defeat me!"

She swung her rapier to the left and right, creating two deep gashes in Susanoo's chest that hindered him for a fraction of a second, allowing Esdeath the time to kick him straight in the gut and send him flying back. He managed to recover himself and came to a screeching halt, his left hand opening so that a small orb of energy could manifest itself in the palm.

The orb grew into a massive sword easily spanning ten meters long and swung out in a large sweeping arc at Esdeath, the trees and shrubbery caught in the blade's way immediately getting severed and cut as if they were paper.

"Ame-no-Murakumo!" bellowed Susanoo at the top of his lungs, Esdeath reacting by creating a multiple layer wall of ice on her side to stop the incoming blade.

To her surprise yet again the blade began to break through and shatter the ice, but thanks to the several layers repeatedly stopping the blade and reducing its cutting power, the sword only reached the halfway point before Susanoo dispersed it, allowing her to recover.

" _This fight is definitely getting more and more interesting!_ " she thought with a smile as she took her battle stance again and aimed her rapier at Susanoo, who narrowed his eyes and glared back at her.

Inside the mansion Tatsumi had been relentlessly pursuing Akame through the building's winding hallways across all five of its levels, but he was only doing so to give off the appearance that he was chasing her.

" _Next time she hides, I'll go the other way so she can go and kill Bolic._ " he thought to himself as he watched Akame dart around a corner up ahead.

When he reached the turning point of the hallway he came to a halt and took a few steps forward, his senses scanning his surroundings for any sign of her. He found her in a matter of seconds, she was in the room to his right, but he disregarded it and stuck to the plan, instead sprinting down the hallway in pursuit of an imaginary Akame.

A few seconds later Akame herself emerged from the room and checked to make sure the coast was clear before going back the way she came at a slower pace. She knew exactly where Bolic's personal chambers were and she wasted no time in getting there.

"There's nowhere to hide." she said quietly as she grasped Murasame tightly and pushed open the doors.

It only took her a few minutes before she sprinted back out and began to search for the quickest route to the roof. When she finally arrived she looked out over the garden and announced, "Mission accomplished! Bolic's dead!"

"What?!" exclaimed Wave after avoiding a spear made up of Cross Tail's threads from Lubbock, who was gripping his side with his other arm.

At that moment Tatsumi emerged from the shadows and lunged at Akame, the assassin leaping away to avoid the punch and landing softly on the grass next to Gazia. One look from her was all it took for him to lose interest in fighting Solomon and prepare his next move with Isterio.

"Piercing Scream!" he shouted before he played the familiar tune, Esdeath flinching slightly when the high-intensity sound waves struck her ears and caused her body to go slightly numb.

Thankfully she had put in earplugs in anticipation for the move earlier and wasn't quite affected by it, the other Jaegers having done the same thing on her orders. "I won't let you get away!"

She swung her hand out and formed a massive ball of ice in the air above her, the ball splitting apart into various shards that lanced out at the two Night Raid Members and threatened to impale them.

To counter Gazia played another note with Isterio that created a series of deafening sound waves that pulsated and passed through each of the Jaegers, pushing them back a few feet and knocking away the ice shards before finally striking Bolic's mansion and blowing apart an entire half of the building. Dust spewed out over the garden upon its destruction and in the midst of the chaos Susanoo managed to grab Najenda and Leone before fleeing with Gazia, Akame, Mine and Lubbock.

When the dust cleared, Night Raid was gone and the Jaegers were left with a crushing defeat since the person they had been told to protect was now dead. Tatsumi grabbed Neuntote and sifted through the rubble with Wave and Solomon until they discovered Bolic's corpse, further adding salt to the wound.

"Dammit, we failed." cursed Wave as Grand Chariot faded away, Incursio doing the same thing and revealing Tatsumi's concerned expression.

"This was merely a battle that's apart of the larger war. Next time they won't be so lucky." said Solomon as he pat him on the shoulder and grinned, Wave nodding back and sighing.

Esdeath and Tatsumi stood separated from the other Jaegers, their minds still racing even after the battle had ended due to the fact that the next step in their plan was now falling into place. There was still the problem though of breaking the news to their allies and if they would even fight with them or not.

"Now the Path of Peace will go ahead with its insurrection, I assume?" she asked under her breath, Tatsumi slowly nodding.

"Yeah. Now's when things get hairy."

 **\- Five Hours Later -**

The beaten, yet still alive, members of Night Raid had stopped their fleeing to set up camp several miles out from Kyoroch, their mission within the city now complete. As they sat around a campfire resting, Lubbock reached over and tapped Akame on the arm.

"Good job finding a way to get to Bolic. I don't think I would've been able to last any longer against that Jaeger I was fighting, right Mine?"

"He was pretty powerful." replied Mine with a nod, Akame looking over at her and smiling weakly before her shoulders slumped and she sighed.

"Actually, about that…"

"What is it Akame?" asked Najenda after Susanoo finished patching up Leone, since her some of her wounds didn't fully heal. "You did kill Bolic, right?"

Akame bit her lip and lowered her gaze, Najenda raising an eyebrow in anticipation of her answer while the other Night Raid members looked at her and waited in silence.

"N-No, I didn't. He was already dead when I found him."

"Already dead? What do you man by that?" asked Leone.

"It's exactly what it means. I wasn't the one to kill Bolic because somebody already did beforehand. And it couldn't have been one of the Jaegers either since I didn't see one of them leave."

Najenda frowned and rubbed her chin with her hand in deep thought, the surprising revelation causing some suspicion to arise from inside. If it hadn't been Akame to kill their target, then just who in the world was?

"Could it have been Chelsea?" she asked, since they were all still unsure about their teammate's fate.

"No, this wasn't her work." replied Akame before her mind drifted back to the sight she had seen upon entering Bolic's personal chambers as she told them what happened.

She expected him to be sitting atop his throne, but she was wrong. He was pinned to the wall behind it by a knife in each hand and his throat had been cut nearly halfway through, his jugular and every other important artery and vein severed. When she examined his body more closely she discovered that he had been dead for at least a few minutes, meaning that he had died while they were occupied with the Jaegers.

"If it wasn't you, and it wasn't the Jaegers or Chelsea...then who _could_ have killed him?" asked Mine after Akame finished her recollection.

"What about someone from the Path of Peace?" questioned Lubbock, but that idea was quickly shot down by Najenda.

"No." she said with a stoic face before she set her gaze on everyone around her. "Whoever killed Bolic is someone completely different...someone was isn't from the Revolutionary Army or the Empire. A third party we have yet to see."


	12. Assassination Vows

A/N The plot thickens...and that asshole Bolic is dead. Yay. But now that he's out of the way...Let the revolution and the fun times begin. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 11 - Assassination Vows**

It wasn't even three days after Bolic's assassination when, with his influence ceasing to exist, the Path of Peace orchestrated an armed uprising and took full control of Kyoroch from any Empire supporters. Believing that fighting against the Empire that oppresses its own people was their calling, they assaulted the government offices that imposed heavy taxes and the storehouses of the landlords.

Although the Great Lord wanted to avoid bloodshed, understanding that land and food were needed to sustain the massive number of followers, he agreed to the rationale of the religious group's leaders.

Many of the citizens oppressed by the Empire also rose up in response to the uprising. The revolution spread throughout the Empire. Simultaneously, the Western Nations revealed their true strength and began an invasion with a massive army that the Empire had no idea about. The inexperienced military of the Empire suffered one defeat after another, and allowed the nation's army to penetrate deep into the Empire's territory.

Thus...the Empire found itself with many problems on its hands.

 **\- Imperial Palace -**

The Prime Minister walked through the soft breeze towards a small pond where the Emperor himself sat on his knees, a slight frown on his face. He was thinking over all of the most recent problems that had arisen as a result of the Path of Peace instigating an armed uprising. They were being surrounded on all sides, with the religious organization from the east, the Revolutionary Army from the south, and the Western Nations' army from the west.

" _General Esdeath's army would definitely bolster the capital's forces and be able to hold off the Western Nations...but even they would fall eventually._ " he thought with a slight growl. " _And we can definitely call them back, but they're still wrapped up with securing the Empire's hold on the Northwestern Territories...bah, this matter can be discussed later._ "

He strolled up to the child Emperor and glanced down at him, his frown vanishing when he looked up at him with a worried expression.

"Hey, Minister. I heard that one of our armies lost to the Western Nations again. Will we really be alright…? It sounds like we're surrounded by enemies on all sides."

"Ho ho. My, where did you hear something like that, your Highness?" asked Honest with a jovial laugh.

"From Seigei, the Secretary of Domestic Affairs."

Honest's eyes narrowed and he hid his distaste behind a fake smile to ease the Emperor's spirit. "I see...It seems that Seigei is running away from his responsibilities."

"What do you mean?"

"The uprising across the Empire which is occurring right now is the Secretary of Domestic Affairs' responsibility. He is trying to take the heat off his back by distracting us with news of the Western Nations." stated Honest before he held his arms behind his back and chuckled. "Please do not worry about our foreign enemies, we've called General Esdeath's army into action."

The Emperor's attitude instantly flipped upon the mentioning of Esdeath's army and he smiled, the Prime Minister returning the gesture. "Then that means…"

"Yes, General Esdeath will no doubt be able to rout the invading army. The number of soldiers is no longer of any importance. A thousand-year old empire will be bound to have something like this happen eventually, but please, do not worry. Please remain calm and collected, and be the pillar that supports the people."

"I understand! If the Emperor is weak-minded, the Empire won't be able to stand strong. Thank you Minister!" said the Emperor as he sprung to his feet, instantly becoming his normal optimistic self, much to the Prime Minister's appreciation.

As they walked back towards the palace entrance where a pair of Faceless stood unwavering and motionless, his mind delved back into the matters he had previously put on hold before his discussion with the Emperor.

" _I'll also put in a call to have the God of Death be sent to the front lines with General Esdeath's army so that we can make sure the Western Nations are defeated. Then we can focus solely on the Revolutionary Army and the Path of Peace._ "

 **\- Jaegers HQ -**

 **\- One Hour Later -**

"You're being called to the western front to fight to Western Nations' army?" asked Tatsumi from the bed as Esdeath crumpled up the request form and tossed it into the garbage bin beside her desk.

"Apparently so. My army is being mobilized from the Northern Territories right now and I'm to meet with them" said Esdeath with a sigh as she leaned back in her chair.

This was an unfortunate circumstance that they didn't see coming. They didn't expect the revolution would occur so quickly after Bolic's death and already the combined forces of the Path of Peace, the Revolutionary Army and the Western Nations had secured a great number of victories against the Empire. No wonder they had called in Esdeath and her army, they were probably the only ones capable of actually holding them off.

"What do you think we should now? Do you know when you're supposed to depart?" asked Tatsumi before he got up off the bed and walked over to her so he could massage her shoulders.

"In a week, the distance for my army to travel from the Northern Territories will easily take them a week even on horseback due to the nature of the terrain between them."

"Then before that happens, we need to go ahead and assassinate the Prime Minister." said Tatsumi, Esdeath turning to look up at him with a raised eyebrow.

"This quick?" she asked. "But what about the others? We'll have to tell them too."

"And we will, I promise. But what we need to do is figure out just how exactly we're supposed to get close enough to kill the Prime Minister."

"Well...it'll take time, but we'll need to memorize the guard rotations in and around the Imperial Palace." said Esdeath as she stood up and stretched her arms, Tatsumi leaving her side and walking over to their room's door and opening it.

"Let's go then. We've got a week to pull this off, so let's get it done as quickly as possible."

The days seemed to fly by and the fourth day arrived in the blink of an eye, with Tatsumi and Esdeath taking every chance they could to observe the Imperial Guard and the Faceless from afar. Tatsumi even took it a step further and risked exposure by using Incursio's invisibility to infiltrate the palace grounds and get an even closer look.

The eve of Esdeath's departure was three days away, and they planned to attempt the assassination the night before, which meant they had only two days left to tell the other Jaegers of their plot.

It was around noon when the two decided that now would be the best possible time to tell them, so to get them all in one place Esdeath called for a meeting in the living room. While they congregated there with Tatsumi going to start the conversation for her, Esdeath took the time to head upstairs back to their room and take a quick shower to gather her thoughts and prepare herself for what was to come.

" _Wave, with some persuasion, will most likely be with us. Solomon won't care either way, and Chelsea will for sure agree._ " she thought as the warm water flowed through her hair and down her back. " _Bols and Run are a possibility, and Kurome...she'll need some work._ "

Meanwhile all of the Jaegers had finally gathered in the living room, Chelsea being the last to enter and find a seat. In the time she had spent there at the mansion she had expanded her horizons beyond assassinations, with Solomon acting as her teacher. She was learning his style of fencing with a rapier and was coming along greatly.

"So, what's the occasion?" asked Wave as he leaned back in his chair.

"And where's the Captain at?" questioned Kurome as she glanced around the room and noticed Esdeath wasn't present.

"She'll be here in a few minutes. In the meantime she gave me the go ahead to tell you all why we're here." started Tatsumi as he crossed his arms and shifted his weight to the right leg. "How do I put this…"

"If you've got something to say, you might as well spew it. You've got our attention." said Solomon from where he sat leisurely on one of the couches.

"Here recently in the past few weeks, Esdeath and I have been keeping something from you all...something that we've decided to bring into the light before she leaves for the western front."

"Another secret?" asked Run, Tatsumi nodding regretfully.

"Tatsumi, what is it…?" asked Chelsea with a concerned look on her face, which didn't help the situation for him at all.

He was literally on the edge of the abyss, and what he said next could either spell disaster and split the Jaegers or bring them together to finally put down the tyrannical reign of Prime Minister Honest. It all depended on the couple of sentences he would say in a matter of moments, and he was stressing out.

" ** _Relax, Boy. Remember what that religious priest told you._** " spoke Tyrant to him inside his mind, Tatsumi thinking back to the conversation he and Esdeath had with the Lord.

He immediately relaxed when the religious leader's words came back to him and removed the stress from his body like a miracle cure, his mind now clear and free of everything. He focused his gaze on all of the Jaegers and he prepared himself for what was to come, no matter the consequences.

"Okay. You all know that I'm formerly from Night Raid right?" They all nodded. "Their ultimate goal is to assassinate the Prime Minister and free the Empire and its citizens from his grasp."

"And that's why the Jaegers were created. To put a stop to them before that happens." stated Kurome with a small smile, Tatsumi keeping his frustrations hidden.

"Yes...but the reason why Night Raid wants to kill Honest is simple. _He_ is the prime reason why the capital and the Empire as a whole is swamped with corruption and rampant with poverty." said Tatsumi harshly with a heavy scowl, Kurome's smile vanishing and the Jaegers, besides Chelsea, all looking at him with wide eyes at how sincere this statement was.

"I am a firm believer of this idea because my closest friends were murdered by rich aristocrats here in the capital, and instead of reporting it, the Imperial Police just covered it up like it never even happened. This is why, in my personal opinion, Prime Minister Honest _must_ die."

Just like he had expected Kurome visibly stiffened up, her fierce loyalty to the Empire, which had been drilled into her ever since she had first been admitted into the Group of Terror, making its presence known. To ease her somewhat Wave placed a hand on her shoulder, silently telling Tatsumi to continue afterwards.

"I want to ask you all a question. Am I wrong when I say that the Empire is not as great as people, like Seryu, make it out to be? That it's filled to the brim with corrupted politicians who only care for themselves and not for the people?" he asked, the Jaegers remaining silent while the question hung heavily over their heads like an iron curtain.

Of course, like he had also expected, Chelsea was the first to respond.

"No. Before becoming a member of Night Raid and the Revolutionary Army, I was in service to a cruel viceroy who took pleasure out of hunting people _for_ sport. None of the people he killed deserved their fates and he had no right to do such things, but it happened anyways because there was no one who cared enough to stop him. That's why I killed him." she said coldly, the old memories coming back.

Run glanced up at her and he shifted uncomfortably in his own seat, Tatsumi catching the awkward movement and waiting until he looked his way. When they finally made eye contact he urged him to speak with the nod of his head, Run sighing and resting his hands in his lap.

"He...He's not wrong. I was formerly a school teacher in a small village near Joyou. I loved that job and the town, and I probably would've retired there as well. But one day, I came back to my classroom and...and I found all of my students killed, _slaughtered_." he said with a shudder when images of their corpses flashed back into his brain and plagued him like some virus. "And just like what happened with your friends, Tatsumi, rather then report the incident and damage the town's reputation, they just covered up the entire incident."

Wave looked around at the group and leaned forward, his hands clasped together in a ball as he rested his elbows on his knees and closed his eyes. "Back in Kyoroch, the guy we were supposed to protect...he was drugging women and turning them into his own personal sex slaves while he was with the Path of Peace."

Bols, Run and Chelsea all looked at him with baffled expressions, a slow nod from the former navy member confirming the statement as the truth. With three of them out of the way, four counting Tatsumi since he started it off, it was Bols' turn to bury his masked face into his hands and shudder slightly when horrific memories of his own came creeping back.

"As a member of the Incineration Squad...I burnt down countless villages and killed so many people. I was ordered to do it because the commanders thought they were allied with the Revolutionary Army. But, deep down...I knew they were all innocent. Every single one of them. The men...the women...the _children_...I'm never going to forget the _screams_ …" he sobbed.

Tatsumi waited for everything that had been revealed up to this point to sink in before he cleared his throat to get everyone's attention back on him again.

"With these reasons in mind, alongside my own...Esdeath and I are planning on killing the Prime Minister ourselves." he said with the utmost seriousness in his tone.

"You _and_ the Captain?" asked Kurome in total shock, the expression the rest of the Jaegers shared saying everything else for them.

"I-Is that true?" asked Run.

"Yes, every last word."

All heads turned towards the entrance when Esdeath, dressed in her casual attire and her hair in a ponytail, walked in and made her way around the furniture until she stood next to Tatsumi with her arms crossed.

"B-But you're a General of the Empire, someone who's supposed to be utterly loyal to the Empire! That's treason!" sputtered Wave as he shot up from his seat.

Esdeath looked up at Tatsumi and smiled softly before she focused back on Wave and said, "I'm still trying to figure out how I was swayed, but...my love for Tatsumi is stronger then my loyalty to the Prime Minister. He even managed to get me to stop doing torture."

"Really?" asked Run, who was surprised considering she had formerly been a die-hard sadist who loved torturing people.

Esdeath nodded and Run traced his fingers through his hair in disbelief while Wave sat back down and continued to stare at the pair in silence.

"But why tell us? Why tell us of what you plan to do?" asked Solomon, Tatsumi looking over at him and chuckling.

"Well, to be honest, it's because we're going to need some help. Honest hardly ever leaves the Imperial Palace, and that place is always guarded by members of the Imperial Guard and an even higher division of guards named the Faceless."

"Which is why we need to know if you either with us…" started Esdeath before she glanced at Kurome. "...Or against us."

"Well, you know my answer." replied Chelsea with a slight grin as she popped a lollipop into her mouth and strolled over to where they stood, Tatsumi nodding.

Solomon glanced from one person to the other before he shrugged and got up from the couch, stretching his back somewhat before he walked over to them and came to rest next to Esdeath. "Eh, could be interesting. I've always wanted to fight the Imperial Guards anyways."

Bols, Wave and Run remained seated, still unsure of what to do, while Kurome sat with her arms in her lap and her eyes lowered. Suddenly Run exhaled deeply and stood up, calmly making his way over to the growing group of Jaegers on the other side of the living room.

"I made a vow to avenge my students by changing the Empire from the inside. I'm with you if this will help accomplish that goal." he said with a determined look on his face.

Now it was just Bols, Wave and Kurome who had to decide what they wanted to do. And after a matter of seconds it was Bols who stood up and held his hands up, glancing down at them and all the times he had held his wife and daughter with them...and all the times he had used them to turn innocent people into ash.

"I know...that someday karma will catch up to me and I'll have to pay for my actions." he said in almost a whisper before he clenched his fists. "But, maybe...just _maybe_...if I can do this now, I'll be able to make up for some of my mistakes."

With that he lowered his hands and walked over to the Jaegers committed to killing Honest, Tatsumi greeting him with a handshake, Bols returning the gesture and nodding solemnly as he looked back at the remaining two Jaegers.

Deep down, Wave was battling himself and his ideals over the current circumstances. Nearly all of his comrades had decided to help Tatsumi and Esdeath kill Prime Minister Honest, yet at the same time he was honor-bound as a soldier of the Empire to not give in to treason and to fight them until his dying breath.

" _I don't know what to do…! They're my friends, but at the same time, they're turning into my enemies!_ " he shouted at himself as he squeezed his eyes shut.

He thought of Tatsumi and how his friends had been murdered, how Run's students had been slaughtered, how Chelsea had to serve a man who considered hunting down human beings a sport, and how Bols had been ordered to incinerate countless groups of innocent men, women, and children. All of these thoughts went 'round and 'round in his head like a typhoon until suddenly, a new presence made itself known inside him, one possessing a great will and power that he never felt before.

" ** _Believe me when I say this. Wave, Tatsumi had made a decision exactly like yours when he joined the Jaegers and had to fight against Night Raid._** "

" _Who the-?!_ "

" _ **This is Tyrant, the Danger Beast your armor was forged from. I'm talking to you now through Tatsumi.**_ " replied the dragon, Wave opening his eyes and looking back to see that while he was deep inside his own head, Tatsumi had walked around behind him and had placed a hand on his back.

" ** _I berated him for forsaking his friends, but he told me that you all, the Jaegers, were his new family now, especially the blue-haired female, and showed me that he was willing to risk me taking over his body to stay by your side, to have you as a comrade. He also knows that you are driven by your ideals to remain loyal to the Empire, but what he has said is true. The Empire you serve has been long gone, replaced by one now ruled by a man who values nothing else except himself. By killing the Prime Minister, you will be fulfilling your duties by removing a virus that needs to be destroyed._** "

Wave was left utterly speechless by the Danger Beast's words, and once he felt Tatsumi's hand leave his back he turned around again and looked up at him, his friend smiling softly as he returned to Esdeath's side. He looked over at Kurome and she glared at him, a shiver running up and down his spine,.

"Wave...if you go over there, I'll have to kill you too." she said darkly, the Jaegers all tensing up when they felt her killer intent spike.

"Kurome, I..." started Wave before she stood up and unsheathed Yatsufusa, which she had taken with her on her way to the living room.

Tatsumi held up a hand when Run moved to assist Wave, a quick glare telling him that everything was going to be fine.

" _I hope._ " thought Tatsumi as Wave stood up from his seat and raised his hands up to show that he wasn't going to fight her.

"Kurome, listen to me. The Empire, it's not what it used to be. It's gotten bad, _really_ bad."

"First it was my sister, but now all of you?" asked Kurome before her scowl wavered and tears appeared in the corners of her eyes. "I don't want to kill all of you, but I have to! You're going to betray the Empire!"

"Kurome, please."

She looked over at Run who was staring at her with a concerned expression on his face, the other Jaegers looking at her the same way. She looked back at Wave and watched as he slowly inched his way towards her and began to lower Yatsufusa's blade down, reducing the threat it posed little by little.

"I know what you're going through right now, and so does Tatsumi. He had to do the same thing upon coming to us from Night Raid." he said as he fully lowered her Teigu to where it wasn't pointing at him and grasped her by the shoulders, the tears in her eyes now streaming down her cheeks. "But this is the right thing to do. The Prime Minister has turned the Empire into hell for the people. Our duty as the Jaegers is to stop criminals, correct?"

Kurome slowly nodded and Wave smiled softly. "The Prime Minister is the worst criminal of them all, since he's the one who's allowed this country to become what it is now and for the politicians who helped corrupt it do whatever they please. It wasn't easy, but now I firmly believe that killing Honest now is the best course of action to take, even though deep down my ideals are screaming at me not to."

"Kurome, I used to be in the same position you're in." said Esdeath before she uncrossed her arms and intertwined one of her hands with Tatsumi's. "But even I changed."

"Captain...Wave…" whispered Kurome before she gripped her head with her free hand and closed her eyes. "My head hurts...But…"

Finally, to everyone's relief, she fully dropped her arms and allowed Yatsufusa to fall out of her fingers and hit the carpet with a soft thud. Wave smiled as he reached up and wiped the tears from her eyes before she hugged him tightly. He bent down and picked up her sword after she was done, Kurome returning it to its sheath before she joined him as they walked over to the rest of the Jaegers and completed the group once again.

"So it's settled. We're all in on this?" asked Esdeath with a glance at every member, who replied with a single nod. "Very well. The day after tomorrow is the day we'll assassinate Prime Minister Honest."

"We'll be saving the lives of so many people…" said Chelsea when she remembered the that Western Nations army, the Path of Peace and the Revolutionary Army were currently on their way towards the capital.

"Let's do it." said Wave with a grin before the group split apart and made their way back towards the exit.

Before Esdeath could take even a few steps towards the door, Tatsumi reached out and stopped her. She looked back at him and raised an eyebrow in confusion when he lowered his gaze and ran a hand through his hair.

"What is it?" she asked, the other Jaegers catching wind of the question and stopping to turn and listen in.

"Before this is all said and done, there's one thing that I want to ask you, Esdeath." he said, Esdeath fully rotating herself while he took both of her hands into his own and squeezed them softly. "It's something that I've thinking about for a while...and I think now is the perfect time to ask you."

"A-Ask me what…?" stuttered Esdeath when, before her very eyes, Tatsumi pulled something out of his pants pocket, a tiny black box, and got down on one knee.

"Esdeath, will you marry me?" he asked as he opened the tiny box, Esdeath covering her mouth with her hands when she saw the gold ring sitting within the box.

The room was silent, the Jaegers waiting for what would happen next. Esdeath looked at the ring for a few more moments before she lowered her hands, the biggest smile anyone could possible imagine appearing on her face while tears of joy emerged in the corners of her eyes.

"Yes...yes!" she said, Tatsumi standing back up and grunting slightly when she threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. "Nothing would make me happier then to be your wife!"

"Well I'll be damned. I wasn't expecting this." remarked Solomon with a chuckle when they separated and faced them with smiles on their faces. "I'm assuming the ceremony will be tomorrow?"

"Oh most definitely." replied Tatsumi as he squeezed Esdeath's hand, her blush growing in volume.

 **\- The Next Day -**

 **\- 10:00 a.m -**

It seemed like the hours that followed after his proclamation went by like a bolt of lightning, lasting only milliseconds. That night Tatsumi and the rest of the male Jaegers had went off into the city to celebrate while Esdeath, Kurome and Chelsea remaining at headquarters to conduct their own celebration. Tatsumi and Esdeath however, when the following day came around, couldn't have been happier when they arrived at the cathedral where the ceremony would be held ahead of everyone else.

News of their marriage spread throughout the entire capital like wildfire and everyone, from soldiers and Imperial Policemen to politicians and aristocrats, journeyed to the cathedral to witness their marriage. There was word that even the Emperor and the Prime Minister themselves would attend, which meant that while the bride and groom got ready the cathedral would be transformed into a heavily armed fortress.

"You nervous? asked Wave as he watched Tatsumi finish up with his bowtie and look himself in the mirror within his room.

"You have no idea." he replied with a nervous chuckle as he turned around to face his best man.

He nod his head as a sign of approval and they walked towards the door together, leaving the room and making their way down the long hallway towards a set of heavy oak doors. They came to a halt before them and Tatsumi cracked them open to take a peek inside the main atrium.

"Holy shit that's a lot of people…" he uttered when he took in the sheer amount of denizens that were seating themselves before the altar.

"Don't worry, you'll be fine. I heard that the Prime Minister even pulled some strings and got some of the Faceless to guard this place. If you think Night Reid's gonna crash the wedding, I highly doubt it with them here plus the already enormous amount of Imperial Guards here as well."

"That does make me feel a tad bit better…" said Tatsumi before he cracked his knuckles and grinned. "Alright, let's go."

Wave opened the doors for him and the two walked inside, Tatsumi getting mixed looks of awe, jealousy and joy from those around him as he strode up to the altar. When he got there he gave a silent thanks to the person who had decorated it for the wedding, because it was absolutely perfect.

Since Esdeath's favorite color was yellow, there were bouquets of yellow roses organized in neat holders all around him, and resting just before him behind where the priest would stand was a grandiose archway literally made of yellow roses.

He turned around and winked at the other Jaegers from where they sat in the first row, Solomon and Chelsea smiling while Bols and Kurome waved. Run wasn't present because he was currently with Esdeath in her personal room and since he was going to be the one to walk her down the aisle.

He saw something out of the corner of his eye and he turned, jumping slightly when Budo himself approached him with a slight grin. "I never would've expected that the subordinate whom I had a discussion with would be Esdeath's husband-to-be."

"Yeah, me neither." replied Tatsumi as he shook the Great General's hand when he offered it to him. "I heard that the Emperor and the Prime Minister would be attending?"

"The Emperor yes, but the Prime Minister had business to attend to, so he won't be coming." said Budo, Tatsumi nodding.

Budo looked to his right and crossed his arms, saying, "And here he comes now. Excuse me."

He stepped off the altar and Tatsumi watched him approach a kid that looked like he was fourteen years old dressed in a cape, a funny looking hat and a gold scepter in his hand. Then he realized that he must be the Emperor since Budo bowed and led him to a seat in the front row across the aisle from the Jaegers, the Great General leaving him with a pair of unarmored but most likely armed Imperial Guards to go stand off on the side.

That was when the priest showed up and everyone within the atrium quieted down, Tatsumi gulping nervously as he focused on the oak doors at the end of the aisle. " _Here we go._ "

" ** _Don't fuck up._** "

" _You're not helping._ " said Tatsumi to Tyrant, the Danger Beast snickering before the organ began its work upon receiving word that the bride had arrived.

The doors were pushed open by two Faceless and Tatsumi couldn't help but revel in awe at how beautiful his soon-to-be wife was. Esdeath was dressed in a pure white wedding dress with light traces of blue swirls along the hemline. He smirked slightly when he noticed some of the females in the crowd develop jealous looks because of her beauty. Run led her down the aisle with a smile on his face, the two staying in perfect step with one another, before finally letting go of her so he could stand next to Wave over off on one side of the altar.

Tatsumi looked at Esdeath through the veil covering her face and she blushed, the nervousness they were both feeling starting to show. The priest made his appearance and they turned to face towards him, any stray whispers within the crowd now completely vanishing. They hardly listened at all through the sermon, those in attendance lightly clapping when he finished and when Tatsumi slid the ring he had gotten Esdeath onto her right ring finger.

"Shall we begin?" he asked of the two, Esdeath and Tatsumi nodding timidly.

"Yes, go ahead." replied Tatsumi, the priest smiling warmly at him before he clasped his hands together and addressed Esdeath first as per custom.

"Do you, Esdeath, take Tatsumi to be your lawfully wedded husband, through sickness and health, through good and bad times, and until death do you part?"

"I do." stated Esdeath, the happiness inside her making her feel lightheaded.

"Do you, Tatsumi, take Esdeath to be your lawfully wedded wife, through sickness and health, through good and bad times, and until death do you part?"

"I do." stated Tatsumi clearly with every fiber of his being.

"Then by the power invested in me by the great Lord above, I now pronounce you husband and wife." proclaimed the priest before he raised his hands up and motioned at them with a nod. "You may now kiss the bride."

Tatsumi turned towards Esdeath and he slowly lifted the veil up and over her head, his eyes never leaving hers. "I love you."

"I love you too." replied Esdeath before they leaned in and kissed, solidifying their eternal bond and causing the entire cathedral to erupt into thunderous applause.

The after party came soon after, with the newlyweds sharing cake and having a splendid time before the dance came where they were to be the first on the floor. Tatsumi led Esdeath out into the center of the ballroom and when the music started playing they became lost, completely oblivious to anything else going on around them. Who could blame them?

When night fell and it came time to return to the mansion, the Jaegers walked in through the front door in various states. Wave and Run were slightly buzzed from drinking some champagne, Bols and Kurome were sober, and Chelsea, also sober, had to carry in an absolutely wrecked Solomon since he could hardly walk. Tatsumi and Esdeath were the last to enter, the Jaegers saying their final goodbyes and Solomon uttering something incoherent before they all retired to their rooms for the night.

However the night had only just begun for the new husband and wife because as soon as they entered their room, the door was locked and the clothes came flying off as they made their way towards the bed.

Tatsumi fell down onto the covers and was instantly assaulted by Esdeath, their lips meeting while their naked bodies pressed up against one another. They momentarily separated so they could take a breather, Esdeath grinning seductively as she reached down and started to stroke Tatsumi's erect member.

"We're not going to go to sleep for a good, _long_ while." she said as she licked her lips, Tatsumi grinning at his horny wife.

"That's fine by me." he replied before she scooted herself away from him and hunkered down, her eyes now level with his cock.

She stuck out her tongue and ran it slowly up his length until stopping at the very top, Tatsumi shuddering at the feeling. She sucked on the head for a few seconds before she took him all in, deep-throating him and bypassing her gag reflex for a moment.

Esdeath brought her head back up and started to bob up and down, slow at first before she began to pick up the pace. Every so often she would take in his entire length and deep-throat him for a good few seconds before returning to her original position, causing Tatsumi to breath sharply through his teeth and clench his fists. After a few minutes he started to feel himself reaching the limit and he looked down at her to see if she was done, but to his dismay she was still enjoying herself.

"Esdeath, I…" he murmured, Esdeath saying nothing as she continued to suck him off.

After another couple of seconds he was at the edge and he grunted when he ejaculated with Esdeath's lips still clamped around his cock. She moaned as the thick streams of his semen shot into her mouth and down her throat, Esdeath keeping her head still until he was finished before she pulled herself off and swallowing it all down. It had a unique taste and she found that she kind of liked it.

"Now for the main course…" she said huskily as she moved up the bed and positioned herself so that she was straddling his midsection, her sopping wet sex right above his cock.

He held onto her hips and helped guide her down until he was fully inside of her, Esdeath moaning again in sheer ecstasy. She leaned down until her face was inches away from his and kissed him, her hips beginning to move on their own up and down his shaft while he gripped her ass cheeks with both hands.

Heavy breaths emerged from their lips after separating from their kiss, the waves of pleasure currently coursing through them only exemplifying their love for one another and urging them on. Thoughts of the assassination plan or anything else were immediately thrown to the side, their minds becoming blank. Maybe it was because they had just been married, but right now the passion and the drive each of them held gave them a feeling that they could keep going for hours on end.

Tatsumi reached his climax once again and he spread his seed out inside Esdeath's womb, coating her inner walls and causing her to shiver from her toes all the way up her spine. She removed herself from him and wanting more she got onto her hands and knees and turned around, baiting Tatsumi by shaking her ass left and right with a dirty smile on her face.

"Bring that little spear of yours over here."

"Oh game on." he said with a laugh as he got up onto his knees and grabbed her hips again before ramming his cock back inside to start the process all over again.

"Oh yes...don't stop! Fuck me harder!" she exclaimed before Tatsumi reached down and grabbed her breasts, squeezing them while he continued to piston in and out of her.

He ran his thumbs over her nipples and she gasped, a grin arising from him as he played with her breasts some more. When he squeezed them again she squealed and Tatsumi felt her cum while he was still inside of her, an even darker shade of red taking over the previous one in her blush when she realized what she just did.

"Y-You'll pay for that…" she said with a slight stutter while Tatsumi laughed.

"I thought you said you'd never let me dominate?" he asked mid-thrust, Esdeath biting her lip to curb a moan.

"Well, um...ah…" she started to say before he picked up the pace, the words she wanted to say getting lost in translation as she moaned again.

"I don't think I've told you this yet, but Esdeath, you have an amazing ass." said Tatsumi with a slight grunt as he slowed down a little bit to catch his breath, one of his hands returning to her hip while the other stayed on her right breast.

"And it's only for you, my love." she replied.

Suddenly Tatsumi removed his cock from inside her and, much to her surprise, he flipped her over onto her back so that way he could have a perfect view of her face when he shoved his dick back inside of her. Her breasts bounced up and down the more he moved in and out of her and to keep herself in place she grasped the bed sheets and moved her legs around his waist.

After two more minutes of having sex he pushed inside as far as he could and released another stream of semen into her womb that mixed with the first round and filled her up even more.

"Whew…" he said as he fell back and supported himself with his arms, Esdeath sighing slightly as she stood up with her legs folded underneath her and sweat beads dripping down her chest.

Before he could react she was straddling his midsection again with an even hungrier look in her eyes, Tatsumi actually feeling afraid because of it. "You can still go, right?"

Tatsumi rolled his eyes before she wrapped her arms around his neck and lifted herself up a little higher so that he could enter her again while at the same time he started to suck on one her breasts. Esdeath started to move her hips up and down and Tatsumi let go of her breast so he could return her kiss when she moved in for it.

He allowed himself to fall back onto the bed sheets again, Esdeath still straddling him on her knees, and reached down with both hands to cup each of her ass cheeks. He squeezed softly and she responded by picking up the pace as she rode his dick, the walls of her sopping wet sex tightening to withstand the blows. After another few minutes of continuous movement, they both reached their limit and Tatsumi pulled her down until their hips met while he released another load inside, Esdeath moaning loudly out of pure ecstasy when she felt her womb become totally full of his semen.

Her body finally gave out on her and she collapsed onto him, his dick remaining inside of her sex while she removed her lips from his and smiled. Taking this opportunity to take a break he let out a heavy sigh of relief and brought one of his hands up to stroke Esdeath's hair, a habit he's started to do from time to time.

"Out of everything I've ever done, every battle I've ever fought...none of that comes even close to how happy you've made me today." said Esdeath lovingly as she rested her head on his chest.

"I'll never stop loving you, Esdeath. Nothing will ever come between me and you, my wife." he replied, Esdeath's blush returning when she heard the word she had longed for ever since she first met him.

" _Wife..._ " she thought, her eyes coming to a close as she let her body rest up against that of Tatsumi's and regain its strength.

"You do realize I'm only resting for a few, right?"

"Yeah, I figured as much…" he replied, Esdeath giggling before she ran a hand along his jawline and smiled.

"While we're waiting, I want to ask you another question. If you answer truthfully, I'll give you a _reward_." she asked, Tatsumi glancing down at her with an intrigued look on his face.

"Okay, shoot."


	13. Kill the Minister

A/N Yay Tatsumi and Esdeath are married now. Everything's alright in the world, right? Story over, job done. Yeah no, that's not even remotely possible at this point. There's still a shit ton of story left to write my friends. The Jaegers, who were created by the Prime Minister to curb criminal activity within the capital and bring down Night Raid, have now united in agreement to instigate their own assassination attempt. What happens next is all up to fate now. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 12 - Kill the Minister**

 **\- Office of the Great General, Imperial Training Grounds -**

 **\- 9:00 a.m -**

Budo finished shuffling the papers concerning troop movements in and around the Empire and placed them to the side on his desk, sighing slightly when he felt the return of the bothersome headache he had developed upon waking up an hour earlier. He had to admit, the Emperor had payed no expense in buying the finest champagne for the after party and that even he had indulged himself somewhat in the drinks.

However a little hangover wouldn't stop him from leaving for the Shisuikan today, so he had come here to his office to make sure everything was organized and filed away before his departure.

He moved aside some other various papers he didn't feel looking over yet before he stopped and frowned when he came to a sealed letter that had been hidden underneath. It had no markings to help him identify who the sender was, so he eyed it cautiously for a few seconds before picking it up. He slid his thumb underneath the fold and ripped it open, pulling out the letter and unfolding it so he could read it in detail.

His eyes widened a fraction of a centimeter and he read it again to make sure that he had done so properly before setting down the paper and sighing heavily. He picked himself up out of his chair and strode towards the door, a heavy scowl replacing the frown he had. Seems going to the Shisuikan would have to wait for a couple of hours.

 **\- Jaegers HQ -**

 **\- 12:30 p.m -**

Yesterday had come and gone, and the happy times that the group had experienced the day before, with Esdeath and Tatsumi getting married and the newlyweds committing themselves to a night of intimacy, unfortunately coming to an end. That didn't stop them from reminiscing though.

"Last night was absolutely fantastic…" said Esdeath happily as she laid next to Tatsumi underneath the covers, the couple just now waking up after their sexual escapade.

"You can say that again. I'm still sore." replied back Tatsumi with a laugh.

They stared up at the ceiling for a few more minutes before they dragged themselves out of bed and got dressed, wincing every so often since their limbs were still tight. Slowly they made their way downstairs and arrived just in time for lunch, the Jaegers greeting them when they walked into the dining room.

"There they are. Have fun sleeping in?" asked Solomon with a dirty smirk, Tatsumi glaring at him and rolling his eyes.

"Sorry, but that's classified information." replied Esdeath, Solomon shrugging before he turned his attention to the plate of food resting before him on the table.

It was cooked salmon, and Tatsumi automatically guessed that the person who had made the meal was Wave since he specialized in seafood. He took a bite out of the fish and his taste buds were overwhelmed by the flavor which he could only describe as being heavenly.

"Just to be sure, we're all still in agreement about tonight, right?" asked Esdeath after swallowing the salmon, the question causing them all to halt in their eating and glance over at her with stone-cold expressions.

"I think I speak for everyone when I say that we're a team. We'll stay by your side, Captain, regardless of the outcome." said Wave, Esdeath smiling at his determination and nodding in thanks.

They returned to their meals and continued on with lunch for a few more minutes in silence, the only sounds being the scratching noise their forks made against the plates. Tatsumi looked over at Chelsea and when he saw the smile on her face he couldn't help but chuckle at how relaxed she was being among them.

She noticed him out of the corner of her eye and asked, "What's so funny?"

"Nothing. It's just that I bet you never saw this coming, right? Chelsea?" remarked Tatsumi, the assassin setting down her fork and sighing.

"And you would be right. I still can't believe that here I am, sitting down and eating lunch with the people whom I previously considered my enemies." she replied, the Jaegers listening intently to what she had to say. "But...after being with you guys and all, it feels like I'm back with my friends in Night Raid."

"We're glad to have you as a member and friend as well. You're such a cheerful person to be around." replied Bols courteously, Chelsea blushing in response.

The Jaegers enjoyed the last remnants of their meal before each member left to return to their usual routine on a day off, their minds immediately fast-forwarding to what would take place as soon as night fell over the capital. Tonight was the night they would attempt to kill the Prime Minister and hopefully end this entire conflict with one, swift blow to the heart of the problem. If it succeeded, then hundreds of thousands of lives would be spared on both sides.

It was something that Tatsumi desperately hoped to achieve because deep down, after every engagement they've had with Night Raid thus far, he's been wracked with guilt over leaving them behind. Every blow he delivered, every cut or jab with Neuntote he made, it destroyed a part of his soul. He wanted to end it now so that they wouldn't have to fight any longer and so that maybe they could become friends again.

" _Akame, Leone, Lubbock, Mine...all of you guys…_ " thought Tatsumi as he stood in the center of the garden underneath the tree where he and Esdeath had officially started their relationship. " _I hope that after this is over...that we can all be friends again…_ "

"Tatsumi? Are you okay?"

He jumped and quickly turned around, but he relaxed when he saw that it was only Esdeath. "Yeah, I'm fine. Come here."

She walked over to him and he wrapped an arm around her shoulders, the two looking back at the tree and Esdeath almost immediately remembering the special importance it held to the both of them. Instead of saying anything they remained silent and just let themselves remember all of the experiences and events that had occurred so far that had brought them to this point in time.

"Are you worried about tonight?" asked Esdeath, Tatsumi sighing and removing his arm from around her.

"Of course I am. There's so many unknown factors that could come into play, and I'm afraid that someone's going to get hurt, or worse."

She slipped her hand into his and rested her head on his shoulder, a smile on her face. "Don't be. All of us are capable of taking care of ourselves. You should know that more than anyone."

"Yeah, but still…" replied Tatsumi as he looked up towards the brightly shining sun. "I can't help but have a bad feeling about this…"

 **\- 11:48 p.m -**

As the full moon drew closer and closer to the height of its ascent over the capital, its luminescent glow providing the only light next to the more brightly lit up areas of the city, the Jaegers all assembled atop the roof of their mansion.

Each member possessed had their Teigu in hand or on their person, with Bols shouldering the heavy fuel tank needed for Rubicante, the wings of Mastema unfurling themselves behind Run, and Wave resting Grand Chariot's key on his shoulder. Solomon cut his hand open and created his blood rapier before resealing the wound again, Chelsea hooked the handle for Gaea Foundation onto the clip on the back of her belt while adjusting her own blade within its sheath, and Kurome gripped Yatsufusa's handle tightly while mentally preparing herself.

They all turned to face Esdeath and Tatsumi, who were staring straight ahead above the darkened roofs of the buildings separating them and their goal, the Imperial Palace.

"We are no longer in service to the Prime Minister and the Empire of now." stated Esdeath with a grin when Tatsumi's body was consumed by fire, the armor of Incursio manifesting itself around him a second later.

"As the Jaegers, our service will go to the Empire of the future, one without corruption or fear." he said to finish her sentence while he summoned Neuntote and pointed the spear's tip right at the Imperial Palace. "Tonight, Prime Minister Honest dies."

"Let's do it." said Chelsea as she put a new lollipop into her mouth.

The clock struck 12:00 and the Jaegers moved out from their headquarters, leaping from one rooftop to the other under the cover of darkness. They arrived at a house just outside the wall protecting the Imperial Palace and hid behind a small outcropping to observe the guards looking out over the city from the top of the wall and its base. There were plenty to cover the entire circumference, just like they had expected, but these were merely Imperial Guards, there was still the Faceless to deal with.

Thankfully Esdeath had gotten word that Budo had left for the Shisuikan earlier, so that made getting into the palace a whole lot more easier. After watching the guards on top the wall make their usual rounds, Tatsumi nodded to Wave, Run and Kurome, nodded back and went over next to him. Wave activated Grand Chariot and Kurome drew Yatsufusa from its sheath while Tatsumi turned invisible and Run grew Mastema's wings, going over to grab Kurome afterwards.

"Go." whispered Esdeath when she saw the Imperial Guards stationed at the foot of the wall turn their attention away from their building.

Run took to the sky with Kurome and Tatsumi and Wave both leaped high up into the air, pushing off one another to fly to different parts of the wall. As soon as they landed they got to work, silently eliminating the guards with their weapons while Run watched from above, using Mastema's feathers to kill any stragglers they couldn't reach in time.

Soon enough, the entire top of the wall had been cleared, with Tatsumi going to each individual guard and slashing their throat with Neuntote to make it seem like only one person had killed them. He looked back over at where Esdeath and the others were and gave them a thumbs up, his wife smirking at how well their plan was working.

" _Time for phase two._ " she thought as she drew her rapier and gave the signal for the Jaegers with her, mainly Chelsea, Solomon and Bols, to begin.

They made their way down to the street and Esdeath took the lead, Bols and Solomon at her side while Chelsea remained in the back. An Imperial Guard spotted them and he saluted Esdeath upon her approach, the General raising an eyebrow. "What brings you here at this time of night General?"

"Just doing some rounds before I leave in the morning to meet with my army on the western front." she replied casually, the Imperial Guard nodding.

"Ah, of course. The Western Nations' army are out there. Shouldn't be a problem for you and your troops though."

She glanced left and right, seeing that the Imperial Guards close by had turned and had begun walking away, and grinned somewhat. Quick as a flash Chelsea emerged from behind Bols' large figure and snaked behind the Imperial Guard, the needle in her hand plunging deep into the base of his neck and killing him almost instantly.

"Indeed." replied Esdeath as if the conversation was still going on while Solomon caught the Imperial Guard and quickly retreated into the shadows of a nearby building.

Chelsea opened Gaea Foundation and used the cosmetic Teigu to change her appearance into that of the Imperial Guard who just died. Bols handed her the dead guard's halberd and she replied in the guard's voice, "Well, it was good talking with you General."

"Same to you." said Esdeath with a wink, Solomon returning to her side after hiding the body of the Imperial Guard Chelsea killed.

As soon as the guards close to them were out of earshot, they got to work sneaking around the entire perimeter of the wall and killing off the rest of the Imperial Guards. When they arrived at the three tiered gate entrance, which was undoubtedly staffed by more guards that stood beyond the first one, Chelsea's role came into place where she acted as the guard they knew would always pass by in front on his round.

So far, everything they had planned for was turning out perfectly. Solomon stepped back far enough so that the Jaegers on the wall could see him and he gave a thumbs up, Tatsumi responding with one of his own. He looked up at Run and he swooped down to pick up Esdeath, flying back up to drop her off beside him atop the wall.

"Everything's going according to plan." she told him as they walked to the edge of the wall and looked out over the massive Imperial Palace, their target just inside.

"Now comes the hard part though." he said as he stabbed Neuntote into the concrete and crossed his arms.

They stood there, silently contemplating everything that had led them up to this point. They thought of the day Tatsumi had come back to the Jaegers, of the times they had spent fighting alongside one another.

"I know I've said this before, but I still can't believe how you were able to change me like this. I'm committing treason against the very Empire I swore to protect, and yet...I'm not troubled by it." said Esdeath with a chuckle before she crossed her arms, Tatsumi looking over at her and laughing himself.

"I'd probably feel the same way if I were in your position. But doing this will ensure a better future for our daughter." he said, Esdeath smiling as she looked down and placed a hand gingerly on her stomach.

"Daughter? What makes you so sure that it'll be a girl?"

All of a sudden Tatsumi dispelled Incursio, placed his arm behind Esdeath and kissed her passionately, her eyes shooting wide open in surprise before she accepted his affection and responded by wrapped her arms around his neck. They went on for another minute before they stepped away, Tatsumi grinning when Esdeath blushed.

"I just know."

With that he was consumed by Incursio once again and he took a step back while grabbing onto Neuntote, tipping over the edge of the wall and free-falling towards the soft grass below in an obscure corner of the palace grounds. Esdeath shook her head and laughed when he disappeared into some trees, hardly making any noise at all.

Tatsumi landed on his feet and looked around, making sure there were no guards in his area before he turned invisible and stepped out of the treeline. The Imperial Palace was dark, the Emperor no doubt fast asleep. But the Prime Minister...he knew that he would still be awake doing some sort of devious act at this time of night. All he had to do was find him and shove his spear through the back of his skull, and it would be over with.

He silently made his way towards the palace, aiming to come in through a more obscure entrance point then the front doors. He climbed up some of the marble architecture and dropped down onto a covered walkway, being sure to make as little noise as possible due to the pair of Faceless guarding the doors a few meters away from him.

" _I'm gonna have to kill them quietly if I'm going to be able to get inside._ " thought Tatsumi as he inched closer and closer to the Faceless, his spear at the ready.

When he was within an arm's length of the guards he lunged at the one on the left and impaled him through the chest easily, pinning him to the wall behind him. Before his partner could react or call for reinforcements, Tatsumi grabbed him by the back of the head and smashed his face in through his helmet with his knee, killing him instantly.

The two Faceless dropped to the ground, Tatsumi catching their spears before they did as well so as to not make any noise, and he hid them both behind a small outcropping.

" _ **Well done. You've gotten better at hiding your presence, runt.**_ " said Tyrant as Tatsumi opened the doors the Faceless were guarding and finally entered the Imperial Palace.

" _Thanks._ " replied tatsumi before he returned his attention to his surroundings, double checking every corner and hallway before moving on.

He remembered the layout of the palace like the back of his hand after the repeated incursions he had made previously, so he was able to figure out exactly where he was as soon as he got inside. He turned down another hallway and he pressed himself up against the wall, a pair of Faceless silently passing by him a second later with their halberds at their sides.

Once they disappeared Tatsumi continued on his way again, slowly making his way to the Prime Minister's office he had marked out on the map in his head. A few minutes passed by and when he made the turn onto a familiar hallway he froze up. Standing before him, just a few feet away, was the door offering access to the office of the Prime Minister, his target.

" _This is it._ " he told himself as he approached the door. " _This is for all the innocent people that you killed._ "

He opened the door and stepped inside, the chair the fat man himself would be sitting in facing away from him. The moment of truth was upon him. This would finally bring about the end to an era of strife and despair for the populace of not just the capital, but to the Empire at large. He raised the spear like a javelin and prepared to impale the Prime Minister through the back of his chair.

That's when he sensed the entirely different level of killer intent emerge from behind the chair.

"I commend you on your efforts." said a voice that sent terror coursing through Tatsumi's veins, his eyes widening as he watched the titanic figure of Great General Budo emerge from behind the chair and turn to face him.

He was still invisible, but he knew the Great General knew exactly where he was. That was the one weakness of Incursio's invisibility. He may be able to walk and travel while remaining unseen, but someone who was skilled enough could still sense his presence.

"But, you still fail...Tatsumi." said Budo with a heavy scowl, the slight bolt of electricity lancing across his crossed arms enough to make Tatsumi turn tail and sprint through the still open door.

"Seize the intruder! Do _not_ let him escape!" bellowed the Great General at the top of his lungs as he followed Tatsumi out of the office at a brisk pace.

" _Shit, shit, shit! Why the hell is Budo here?! He was supposed to be gone!_ " thought Tatsumi frantically as he ran for the closest exit possible, which would be the front entrance.

He could hear more footsteps behind him and he took a chance by glancing back over his shoulder, his heart skipping a beat when he saw Budo and a contingent of Faceless hot on his heels. When he reached the front entrance of the palace he lowered his shoulder and busted through the doors like a bullet, the wood exploding apart into splinters as he shot out onto the marble road leading up from the wall's gate.

From above Run could see the commotion and he quickly flew back down to the other side of the gate behind the wall where Esdeath and the Jaegers were waiting. After telling them of the situation they all peeked around the corner of the gate and watched as the Imperial Guards protecting the gates ran out into the interior of the palace grounds with an enormous amount of Faceless, immediately surrounding Tatsumi and cutting off his escape once he became visible again.

He looked back to where they were standing and he could see the look on Esdeath's face. She wanted to help, to save him, but all he did was slowly shake his head to discern her from doing so. All of a sudden a massive bolt of lightning struck him in the back and caused his muscles to spasm uncontrollably, Budo revealing himself to be the source as he walked out from the palace with his arms raised up.

Esdeath couldn't stand to watch him be attacked by the Great General and her grip around her rapier tightened to the point her knuckles turned white, but before she could unleash her wrath Wave placed a hand on her shoulder and held her back.

"We can't stay here. We have to go!"

"But-"

"I'm sorry Captain, but he's right. We'll be caught if we stay here any longer." whispered Run under his breath before he disengaged Mastema and turned around with Solomon and Chelsea, who had lost her disguise.

Esdeath looked back one more time at Tatsumi before she fled with the Jaegers as fast as they could back to their headquarters. Tatsumi felt their presence fade away and he smiled as he collapsed to his hands and knees, his armor fading away and revealing his appearance to the Great General.

"I hereby place you under arrest under the charge of attempted assassination of the Prime Minister." stated Budo as he lowered his arms after cutting off the flow of lightning coming from the gauntlets he wore around his arms, the pair no doubt his Teigu, and approached Tatsumi.

"Do you not know of the atrocities that bastard has committed...?" asked Tatsumi with a glance at Budo. "Are you really fine with taking orders from him?"

The Great General crossed his arms and closed his eyes, his feelings about Honest rising up from within.. "My family has served to protect the Empire for generations. It is our duty to protect his majesty and the Empire."

In an instant his expression morphed from slight amusement to dead seriousness, his cold hard gaze meeting Tatsumi's as he stated, "The current top priority is to eradicate the revolution that threatens the Empire. Afterward, the Prime Minister that brought about this situation in the first place will be dealt with… _accordingly_."

Budo nod his head and a Faceless approached Tatsumi, the guard silently raising his halberd. Tatsumi grinned and closed his eyes so he didn't see the butt of the spear strike the side of his head, knocking him out cold and sprawling him across the ground.


	14. Wrath of the Thunder God

A/N Well shit. That's all I have to say about that. And don't you all find it ironic that this all occurred right before chapter thirteen? Y'know, because of unlucky number 13? Anyone? No? Alrighty then...Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 13 - Wrath of the Thunder God**

For an entire week, Tatsumi was asked questions pertaining to the attempted assassination of Prime Minister Honest by Budo, who was still suspicious about the possibility that he wasn't the only one involved. And every time he asked, he replied with silence. He didn't care what they did to him, he wouldn't betray his friends and his wife.

So, seeing that it was worthless to continue questioning him, it was announced that Tatsumi would be publicly executed so as to send a message to any out there who dared to question the Empire.

On the day he was scheduled to be executed, he was spending his time in his cell beneath the city's coliseum by thinking of his childhood when he heard voices come from just outside the entrance the cell block. He stood up when it was opened and in walked Esdeath, her body involuntarily taking her straight to him.

Without a word she materialized an ice sword in her hand and cut through the bars separating them so she could embrace him, Tatsumi smiling softly when he took in the familiar scent of her hair that he had come to love.

"I've missed you so much…" she said in almost a whisper as she withdrew from his arms and kissed him.

"Me too." he replied in an equally low tone once they managed to pull away from one another.

"I can clear your charges, they'll let you go. I know I-" she started, the words just coming out uncontrollably before he raised a hand up to stop her.

"No, it's fine. Besides, if you try to have me pardoned it'll draw suspicion towards you and the others. I don't want you guys to get dragged into this too."

"Fine? They're going to execute you! And I don't care what anyone else thinks!" exclaimed Esdeath before she threw her arms around him again and squeezed tightly, a shudder running up and down her spine. "I don't want you to die...you're the only man for me...you're my _husband_."

Tatsumi closed his eyes and chuckled lightly as he reached around and grabbed her hands, bringing them back around and holding them in his own as he looked her in the eyes. "I know, and I'm glad that I am. But this isn't just about me...I want our child to have its mother."

Esdeath's lower lip quivered and Tatsumi could see tears starting to develope in the corners of her eyes, so he reached up with his hands and wiped them away with his thumbs while cupping her cheeks.

"Esdeath, I love you with all of my heart. Don't you ever forget that. But this is something I have to do. This is the consequence for my actions that I have to accept, and I'm sorry for endangering all of you with it and putting you into this situation." he said in a light tone, Esdeath lowering her gaze along with her shoulders.

"Don't apologize."

"What?" he asked, Esdeath looking up at him again with teary eyes and wrapping her right hand around his.

"I said don't apologize. If I had to go through all of this again...I would." she said, Tatsumi smiling before he took her again into his arms and hugged her tightly.

They shared one final kiss before Esdeath wiped the fresh tears away and stepped out of Tatsumi's cell so she could start to head back towards the exit.

"And Esdeath?"

She looked back, Tatsumi grinning as he put his hands into his pockets. "If we do end up having a daughter, name her Lucena. And tell her that...that her father died for his beliefs."

Esdeath stared at him for a few more minutes before she nodded once and stepped out of the cell block, Tatsumi sighing heavily before he sat back down on the cold hard floor to await his eventual fate. Outside, Esdeath had walked down the hallway leading away from cells and travelled up a flight of stairs to arrive above ground once again before she was stopped by Budo stepping in front of her with his arms crossed.

"What do you want?" she hissed, Budo glaring at her before he motioned with his head back towards the cells.

"What did he tell you?" he asked, Esdeath narrowing her eyes.

"Why does it matter to you?"

"It matters to me because he tried to kill the Prime Minister." he said darkly as he leaned down and stared directly into Esdeath's eyes. "And also because I don't trust you, _General_ Esdeath."

"And you don't trust me because…?" asked Esdeath as she placed a hand on her hip, the Great General returning to his original height.

"I don't believe that he was able to infiltrate the Imperial Palace alone. He needed help, and who better then his _wife_ and the others in the particular organization he was a part of."

It was Esdeath's turn to glare up at him with her own scowl when she asked, "Are you accusing me of trying to kill the Prime Minister?"

Budo shrugged. "Possibly. Ever since that man joined the Jaegers, you haven't been your usual self. What I want to know is if you are still loyal to the Empire."

"Of course I am." she scoffed, Budo raising an eyebrow before he reached for something hanging from his belt and handed it to her, Esdeath discovering it was her rapier.

"Then prove it by executing him. Prove to me that you are still loyal to the Empire as one of its Generals by killing your traitorous husband." said Budo before turning swiftly around and walking away after handing her the rapier.

Esdeath's heart shattered into bits and pieces as she looked down at the rapier, the very thought of killing Tatsumi causing her body to lock up and lose all feeling whatsoever..

" _Kill...Tatsumi…?_ "

 **\- Two Hours Later -**

The capital's coliseum was filled to the brim with people from all around the capital. They were loudly chattering amongst themselves, with Budo and Esdeath standing on the arena floor itself near the very center. Budo had his arms crossed and held a scowl on his face while Esdeath remained a few feet away from him with her rapier at her side, still in its sheath, and a saddened look on her face.

All of a sudden the crowd quieted down when Tatsumi, strapped to a wooden cross, was raised up from below into the center, the Jaeger blinking several times at the change in lighting before he rested his gaze on the two Generals. He immediately saw the pain in Esdeath's eyes and her rapier and immediately guessed that Budo was making her be the one to kill him.

" _Bastard._ " he thought with a scowl before the entire coliseum became extremely quiet, all eyes now on the two executioners.

In the stands nearest to the arena floor sat the rest of the Jaegers, their feelings about the situation the same as Esdeath's. Chelsea lowered her gaze and looked away while Bols patted her on the shoulder, Solomon, Kurome and Run watching with grim expressions on their faces. Wave however clenched his jaw and stood up, their eyes shooting to him as he started to ascend the stairs back to the top of the stands.

"I can't stand to watch this. Come on guys, I've got a plan."

Esdeath glanced once up at Budo and he nodded, Esdeath looking back at Tatsumi and beginning the long walk up to the cross he was bound to, her sword in hand. When she finally reached him they looked at one another and he smiled, Esdeath closing her eyes and lowering her head. Her insides were in complete turmoil, with the side that loved Tatsumi screaming at her to not kill him while the previously docile side of her that was loyal to the Empire telling her to kill him and preserve her position as General.

"Esdeath."

She was drawn out of her thoughts by Tatsumi's voice and she looked up at him again, his smile causing her heart to choke up.

"I know you'll make the right choice." he said before he closed his eyes and lowered his head, accepting his fate.

"Do it, General." she heard Budo say from behind.

Esdeath grasped her rapier's grip and quickly unsheathed the blade, its tempered steel glinting in the sunlight as she raised it up and pointed the tip at Tatsumi's heart. The crowd watched eagerly in utter silence. The moment of truth had come.

She looked one last time at him and she noticed that the necklace she had given him was still hanging around his neck, only...something was off. She looked closer and her eyes widened. The black cross he wore, the symbol of her army, had been flipped around, giving her a perfect view of the heart made of ice she had engraved into it. Her own heart ached at the sight of it and her grip around her rapier weakened, her mind drifting back to what she had told him upon putting it around his neck.

" _Tatsumi...I..._ "

Quick as lightning, she swung her blade, the crowd gasping while Budo's eyes shot open in total shock. Even Tatsumi was caught off guard when, instead of her blade piercing his heart and ending his life, he felt the restraints on his hands and legs give away, allowing him to drop to the ground and stand up.

"Esdeath…?" he asked, the General lowering her sword and looking at him with a small smile.

"Tatsumi...I'd rather our daughter have both her mother and father." she said before all of a sudden she brought her hand up and the ground trembled, Tatsumi stepping a few feet to the right when the ground cracked open and an ice pillar emerged.

Frozen inside was Incursio's key, and Tatsumi grinned when Esdeath dispersed the pillar to allow him to grasp its handle once again.

"Incursio!" he shouted at the top of his lungs as he stabbed the blade into the dirt, a raging inferno coming to life around him as the visage of the armor appeared behind him and crossed its arms as he was consumed by Incursio.

Once he was fully encased within the armor and had Neuntote in hand, he turned with Esdeath to face Budo, whose face was dominated by a scowl radiating so much hate and anger he was almost turning red.

"You would throw away your position as a General of the Empire for _him_?" he asked, Esdeath's smirk showing itself as she prepared herself to fight the Great General, which was something she had truthfully always wanted to do.

"I'm sorry Budo, but I love him more then this pathetic Empire. I'd rather die then remain loyal to a man like Honest." she said, Budo narrowing his eyes and growling as a contingent of Imperial Guards emerged from the stands and stood around Budo, their halberds already raised.

"That can be arranged." he snarled before he felt several new presences appear out of nowhere and he looked up, the last thing he saw being a flash of blue.

"Grand Fall - Lateral!" bellowed Wave when he dropped down, clad in Grand Chariot, onto the ground between Esdeath, Tatsumi and Budo and launched himself at the Great General with both feet extended.

Budo was too slow to react and Wave smashed his feet deep into the man's gut, Budo's expression contorting into one of immense pain before he was sent flying back right into the coliseum wall, the stone breaking apart upon impact and shooting outwards in a plume of dust and smoke.

"Wave?!" stammered Tatsumi in disbelief when he landed on the ground a few feet in front of them.

"He's not the only one!" announced Solomon as he dropped down next to him, followed by Run, Kurome, Bols and Chelsea, each wielding their Teigu.

"What are you guys doing here?"

"Helping, duh." replied Chelsea with a grin as she and Solomon drew their blades and stood side by side as student and teacher.

"We're a team, and teams stick together no matter what happens." stated Wave proudly as he cracked his knuckles and stared into the hole Budo's body had created after being launched back by him.

Esdeath and Tatsumi, overwhelmed with emotion as a result of their teammates coming to assist them, couldn't help but share a laugh and walk up to take their place at the head of the group as leaders of the Jaegers. Just as they had agreed on before the attempt on the Prime Minister's life, they were united as one.

"Alright, if you all are joining us, then the plan is to defeat Budo here and get out of the capital as quickly as possible!" said Esdeath quickly as the people in the stands began to frantically flee from the coliseum.

With them gone, the Jaegers would be able to fight without worry of injuring any bystanders and could go full power against the Great General.

The Imperial Guards Budo had called in stood and watched them silently, unsure of whether they should attack first or wait, but soon enough that question was answered for them when massive amounts of energy emerged from within the cavity in the coliseum wall. Bolts and streams of lightning lanced out from the darkness, and a few seconds later the Great General himself emerged from the darkness with his cape and shoulder pauldrons discarded and a heavy scowl painted on his face.

"Imbeciles. How dare you create such chaos?" he questioned as he crossed his arms and glared at them.

" _He took my attack...and he's not even fazed?!_ " thought Wave when more lightning began to appear around Budo.

"You, the Jaegers, have made a grave mistake." stated Budo before the gauntlets on his arms activated, the two pistons shooting forward and releasing an enormous amount of lightning that almost doubled the strength of the bolts already dancing around him. "No matter what the cost may be, you will all be executed here!"

As either side stared each other down, the sky began to darken when huge ominous clouds started to swirl and gather over the coliseum, flashes of lightning appearing from behind them appearing seconds before a deafening thunder clap.

"The sky, it's..." stammered Chelsea, Esdeath narrowing her eyes and pointing at Budo's gauntlets with her sword.

"It's because of his Teigu, Adramelech. But that's beside the point. Prepare yourselves, this is the Great General and the Imperial Guard we're dealing with! You cannot let up for even a second!" said Esdeath when her grin appeared again, the excitement she was feeling on fighting Budo starting to overtake her body.

Budo glared at them for another few seconds before he chuckled. All of a sudden the ground erupted around Bols, Chelsea, Kurome and Solomon, the four Jaegers falling down in a plume of smoke to the lower levels of the coliseum, the surprise attack cutting the Jaegers' strength and numbers against Budo in half. Thankfully Esdeath and Tatsumi hadn't been caught in the trap, so they still stood a very good chance against the Great General.

Solomon was the first to recover from the fall and the first thing he realized was that the air smelled different and that after inhaling it he was starting to feel weak and a little drowsy.

"Shit, this gas is toxious!" he yelled out with a cough as the others recovered, Kurome and Chelsea instantly covering their mouths with their arms.

Bols however was left unaffected by the gas thanks to his mask, which filtered out the oxygen in the room and allowed him to breath without worry. He stared into the dimly lit room and made out several figures standing in the shadows of the far side, his finger on the trigger for Rubicante twitching slightly.

"General Budo figured that the rest of you would try something, so he got me to prep the arena floor and the lower levels with a few traps of mine, just in case." said one of the figures as he stepped forward.

He was dressed in a tattered black cloak overtop a matching trench coat, pants and boots, a hat resting on top of his head. His face was covered entirely by a gas mask that enabled him to breath and on one arm he wore a gauntlet outfitted with a retractable blade, and on the other he wore a strange looking device featuring several buttons.

"Let's play a game, shall we?" he asked when the other shadows revealed themselves to be Imperial Guards wearing gas masks as well, spears and shields in hand.

Above ground the fight between Budo, Esdeath, Tatsumi and Wave had taken on a new turn. Since Run had just finished eliminating the Imperial Guards in the arena with Mastema's feathers and taken off through the hole to assist the others, they could now focus solely on taking on Budo, but unfortunately he was proving to be more than a match for them. Even Esdeath was having some difficulty in fighting the Great General.

"You're a tenacious one! Repelling away my attacks!" growled Budo as he poured more lightning into the stream he was firing at Tatsumi, who was holding his ground by spinning Neuntote around and deflecting away the lightning.

Suddenly Wave and Esdeath appeared on either side of him and rushed his flanks in an attempt to catch him off guard. Budo saw them coming and cut off the stream of lightning so as to raise both of his arms and block Wave's kick and Esdeath's rapier.

"You little shits!" he snarled, the clouds above beginning to crackle. "Who the fuck do you think I am?!"

A massive bolt of lightning shot down from above and completely enveloped all three of them, both Wave and Esdeath yelling out in pain as it coursed through their veins and sent their muscles into a frenzy. They dropped to the ground and were left paralyzed, small bolts of electricity lancing across their skin, with Budo lowering his arms and sighing.

"My intentions at first were to capture you all, but now...I will personally execute each and every one of you." he said darkly as he aimed an arm at the two fallen Jaegers, Esdeath growling when she still couldn't move her limbs.

Budo was about to fire Adramelech before a murderous killer intent overtook his body and mind, Tatsumi, the source of it, with rage and anger literally rolling off of him, appearing right in front of his with his arm cocked back and his hand tightened into a fist.

"Don't you _dare_ lay a finger on them!" he roared as he rammed his fist deep into Budo's gut, knocking the wind out of him and propelling him into the air.

He followed the punch up by leaping into the air and bringing his clawed foot around, his heel smashing into Budo's cheek and sending him flying back into the empty stands of the coliseum. While he was temporarily incapacitated Tatsumi helped Wave and Esdeath back up, making sure that they were fine. "Tatsumi, we're good, I promise. Just a little buzzed is all."

"Not funny, Wave." said Tatsumi with a glare before they looked back at where Budo had gone down, the Great General emerging from the rubble again with a stream of blood running down his chin.

He raised a hand up and wiped it away, the lightning circling his body instantly starting to grow more volatile as a result of his anger reaching its breaking point. Without saying a word he smashed his fists together, the lightning around them coming together to form a perfect sphere as he drew them apart.

"Take this!" he shouted as he launched the lightning sphere at them, Tatsumi bringing around Neuntote and batting it aside like it was nothing.

Esdeath countered by creating huge masses of sharpened iscles that she fired at Budo like bullets, the Great General ducking and rolling to the side across the stands as they pierced through the stone mere inches away from him. He leaped away to avoid the last shard and he brought his gaze up only to see Esdeath appear right in front of him with her hand on the ground and a grin on her face.

"Pierce through! Grauhorn!" she exclaimed before a column of ice shot up from the ground right at Budo, the Great General unable to avoid it in time so he held his arms up and allowed it to strike his gauntlets.

The ice pillar struck him full force and he was taken high into the sky, leaving him vulnerable to attack. Esdeath took the opportunity she was given and when Budo finally pushed himself away from the pillar, she poured more energy into the technique and smirked when smaller but just as sharp ice pillars rocketed out of the side of the original and zoomed straight at Budo.

He twisted around the first and yelled out a battle-cry as he smashed his fist into the next one, the ice shattering upon impact and a thunderclap sounding off overhead from the dark clouds. He returned to the ground like a screaming bullet and rushed Wave with his hands consumed with lightning.

They exchanged a series of furious blows, Wave's Grand Chariot enabling him to match the Great General's powerful attacks with his own but unfortunately was still susceptible to his lightning. Budo summoned another bolt of lightning down and it struck Wave, zapping his muscles and paralyzing him again so he could grasp the Jaeger with both arms and lift him high over his head.

Tatsumi was too slow to react and all he could do was watch Budo grit his teeth and bring his knee up.

"You will fall!" Budo bellowed as he brought him down onto his knee, Wave crying out in agony when he felt his spine pop and snap.

"No!" exclaimed Esdeath as she swept her hand to the right and created a wave of sharpened ice shards that raced at Budo, forcing him to retreat and leave behind Wave.

Tatsumi quickly recovered him and laid him down near the edge of the arena, his Teigu dispersing and revealing that Wave was in a pretty bad state, with blood pouring from a cut on his forehead and from his mouth as a result of Budo's devastating attack.

"Wave, are you okay?" asked Tatsumi in worry as Esdeath kept Budo busy in the background.

"Shit, no...I can't feel my legs." replied Wave with a vigorous cough, Tatsumi's eyes widening.

" _His back is broken…he won't be able to walk. Dammit!_ "

Tatsumi glared over his shoulder at the Great General, who was in the midst of busting his way through a multi-layered ice wall Esdeath had created to reach her. Unfortunately for him, thanks to her diminutive size when compared to him, she was able to avoid his attacks and managed stab him in the knee through a joint in his armor.

"Damn you, Esdeath!" he snarled as she leaped away, the grin still on her face.

"You've gotten slower Budo! Has constantly being at the Imperial Training Grounds turned you soft?" she asked, Budo's right eye twitching when something inside him snapped.

The anger within reached its boiling point and transformed into a hellish inferno of pure and utter rage when Budo smashed his fists together, the pistons on each gauntlet striking one another and producing a bright flash that caused the sky above to crackle and spark with growing power.

"Now you've done it...unlike before, my Teigu and I are enraged!" he snarled before the ground shook beneath him, his golden hair now literally standing on edge as if he were ascending into another heightened state of power. "Advent of the Thunder Emperor!"

The dark clouds brightened almost instantaneously as numerous pillars of lightning shot down from above like lasers and struck the arena floor, Esdeath having to duck her head and run through the oncoming storm so as to not get caught within one of the beams.

Two minutes passed of intense bombardment by the Great General's technique before the lightning finally dispersed, revealing Budo and Esdeath in pretty beat up states. Esdeath however was still smiling, the adrenaline in her veins still pumping and giving her strength.

" _I've never been excited like this in my life! I never would've been able to experience a fight like this if I had stayed loyal to Honest!_ " she thought as the duo prepared to engage one another once again.

Over on the side Tatsumi was heaving and coughing after having taken a portion of one of the beams in order to protect Wave, who still couldn't move. He was starting to feel exhausted as a result of the drawn out fight with Budo and at this rate he wouldn't be able to keep Incursio active for very long.

" _Tyrant...I don't care how agonizing it will be, or how much pain I will feel. Give me all the strength you can possibly give me right now! Wave got hurt because I couldn't stop Budo in time...I don't want Esdeath to get injured because of me either!_ " he yelled within his mind, the Danger Beast perking up when he heard his plea.

" ** _I've already fused Incursio to you. In order to access my full strength...you and I must become one. You will become half Danger Beast, just like that Lord person from that religion. Are you willing to accept that fate?_** " asked Tyrant, Tatsumi closing his eyes and clenching his fists.

" _I'll do anything that enables me to protect Esdeath. I don't care what becomes of me, I just want the power to protect the ones I care about!_ "

Tyrant laughed before spreading his wings inside Tatsumi's psyche and opening his mouth wide, the fires of his rage and power emerging around him. " ** _Very well! You and I shall become one being! My knowledge and strength shall be yours! Prepare yourself!_** "

Budo managed to deflect another sword stab from Esdeuath, the two military leaders going all out, but all of a sudden he felt an extreme amount of heat appear from behind him and he rolled to the side when a massive stream of fire shot past him. He looked back and saw that the other Jaegers had managed to defeat his back-up underground and find their way back to the arena, which meant he was the only one capable of defeating them now.

"Captain! We're here for you!" shouted Bols as he stood ready with Solomon, Chelsea, Kurome and Run to take on the Great General.

Before they could act however, the entire coliseum shook with overwhelming power and they all turned towards its direction from where it came from. Tatsumi slowly climbed up to his feet and hunched over, his arms dangling at his sides. He roared to the heavens as a huge ring of fire sprung to life around him and caused the wind to whip and billow around him in all directions. Instead of Incursio appearing behind him, Tyrant himself emerged from the flames and spread out his massive wings that blotted out a portion of the darkened sky, his four glowing red eyes coming to rest on Budo for a few moments before the dragon opened its maw and let out a roar that dwarfed the thunder above in magnitude.

"Is Incursio evolving again?!" yelled Run through the gale-force winds as Tatsumi collapsed to his knees and began to growl and snarl like a raging animal, the armor around him starting to morph and change.

"I don't know, but it looks fucking badass!" replied back Solomon with a grin.

Tatsumi let out another yell when it felt like his skin was set ablaze, but he gritted his teeth and resisted the pain as Incursio continued to adjust to the influx of Tyrant's stored power and strength. The plates on his back shifted slightly to allow for several spines to emerge from the spinal cord on the back of the armor and the horns emerging from his helmet moved over a few inches to allow for another smaller pair to appear beside it. The normally gray armor turned an even darker shade that looked almost black, with some streaks of maroon within it, and the two tassels that had replaced the cape the armor formerly possessed vanished entirely. Now emerging from Tatsumi's lower back was a segmented dragon tail, giving him an even closer resemblance to the Danger Beast the armor was forged from.

Tatsumi, after the fire vanished and the wind finally calmed down, slowly picked himself up and gazed upon the new look Incursio had taken on, and the power coursing through his veins. No...it wasn't Incursio any more. He could hear the Teigu's new name echo inside his head, his grin widening as he grabbed Neuntote and glared at Budo.

"No longer do I wear the Teigu named Demon Armor: Incursio…" he said as he clenched his other fist, Budo tensing up when he felt an enormous power surge come from the individual. "Combining both human and Danger Beast in one body and mind! The Demon Dragon's Flesh: Tyrannus!"

Esdeath and the other Jaegers were staring in awe of Tatsumi's new armor, even Wave, who was still lying on the ground behind him, was left speechless at the sudden power boost his friend had gotten.

Then, quick as a flash, Tatsumi instigated the fight once more by appearing before Budo and smashing his clawed foot into the Great General's chest, causing him to fly once again into the arena wall and become consumed by a cloud of dust. Unlike last time he quickly recovered and threw both arms forward, massive bolts of lightning shooting out at Tatsumi.

"You make light of me?!" he snarled when the bolts struck his foe, but instead of paralyzing him like they had done to Wave and Esdeath before, Tatsumi merely shrugged off the lightning and reared back with Neuntote in hand.

"Is that supposed to hurt!?" he asked before he chucked the spear at break-neck speed, Budo unable to dodge it in time and gasping when the spear punctured his right pectoral through his chest armor.

"Esdeath! Freeze him in place so we can get out of here!" he yelled over his shoulder, his wife quickly replying by slapping her hand to the ground and created thick walls of ice around Budo to keep him occupied for a while.

Once he disappeared from view, Tatsumi quickly sprinted over to Wave and picked him up while the other Jaegers gathered around Esdeath. Once he joined them and handed Wave to Solomon when he offered to carry him they left the coliseum in a hurry, resorting to running from rooftop to rooftop in order to get to the walls quickly.

"Tatsumi! That was awesome! How did you get so much power all at once?" asked Chelsea as they ran, Tatsumi managing a glance back at her before he chuckled.

"I'll tell you all later, right now we need to worry about getting out of the capital, fast!"

 **\- Imperial Palace -**

"So all of the Jaegers have turned traitor now, including Esdeath? My, my...such a loss." said Honest to himself as he dined on freshly cooked steak within his personal office after hearing word of the battle at the coliseum.

"However, they're foolish to think that they'll escape while Budo is still alive." he said before laughing maniacally.

 **\- Capital Defensive Wall -**

They arrived at the wall in under a minute to where all they had to do was leap overtop to be free, but before they could an overwhelming presence appeared behind them once more and Tatsumi turned around too late to stop Budo, who had managed to free himself, from tackling him out of the air and smashing him into the cobblestone street. He tried to respond with a punch but Budo enveloped his fist with lightning and knocked Tatsumi to the side with a backhanded swing.

"I will not allow you to escape!" he yelled at the top of his lungs before he summoned more lightning bolts to come crashing down onto the area around him, the Jaegers ducking and rolling to avoid them.

Esdeath took a chance to attack Budo from behind and create a deep gash in his back with her rapier, Budo hacking out blood before he swung his leg around and kicked her over to where Tatsumi had landed. She coughed when she struck the cobblestone road and Tatsumi was immediately at her side.

" _How many internal and external injuries I sustain does not matter. I will put an end to them here!_ " he thought as he bared his teeth and tightened his fists as he resisted the screaming in his limbs and glared at his two foes.

Tatsumi helped Esdeath to her feet and she spit out some blood, the grin on her face still present. He noticed the expression and he rolled his eyes. " _Old habits never die, I guess._ "

"Esdeath, take a breather. I'll finish Budo off." he whispered to her before he took a few steps forward and held out his hand, a pillar of fire erupting from the ground beside him and giving him his spear back once again.

Esdeath wanted to argue with him, to say that she could still fight, but when he gripped the bottom of his armor's helmet and ripped it off so he could spit out some blood, she saw a smile on his face...the same one she remembered him having when she first fell in love with him. That determination to win and to protect those he loved at all costs, she couldn't help but feel at ease.

"No matter what, I will execute you." said Budo darkly before he created another ball of pure lightning and shot it at Tatsumi, the Jaeger growling as he swung the spear and chopped the lightning literally in half.

Instead of flying out around him, the ball exploded into a storm of individual bolts that enveloped him and sent his nerves into an uncontrollable fit. Thanks to Tyrannus however he was able to resist the effects and glare at Budo once again, heavy breathes emerging from his lips.

He pushed aside the tingling sensation, rushed the Great General and lunged with his spear right at his gut, Budo grunting as he caught the weapon with his bare hand and punched Tatsumi right in the jaw. He rebounded quicker then he expected and let go of the spear, leaping up and slamming the side of his foot into Budo's head and sprawling him on the ground. He landed back on the ground, kicked Neuntote up with his other foot back into his hand and stabbed the spear right into the joint between Budo's forearm and bicep, the Great General growling and holding back against the cry of pain his body wanted to so desperately let out.

He brought his other arm up and rammed his fist deep into Tatsumi's gut, knocking the wind out of the man and causing him to hack out even more blood. He let go of the spear, enabling Budo to remove it from his arm and stand back up to grasp him by the throat and lift him up, repeatedly beating him with his other fist in the rib cage multiple times.

"Draconian Ascension!" roared Tatsumi through the pain, Budo's eyes widening a fraction of an inch before a ring of fire emerged around them and erupted into a full-fledged inferno.

He instantly let go of Tatsumi to cover his face and shield himself from the flames while Tatsumi was left completely unaffected by the fire, the momentary drop in Budo's defense allowing him to leap back a few meters to recover.

When the flames finally died down, Budo removed his arms from in front of his face, revealing that he had sustained some light burns, but otherwise was completely fine. Both fighters were nearing their limit, with Budo's body wracked with pain from the multiple stab wounds he had sustained and Tatsumi's reeling from all of the broken ribs and internal bleeding he had received from Budo's assault.

"Don't...fuck with me…" said Tatsumi through ragged breaths, the Great General narrowing his eyes. "I don't care if my body breaks...we're all getting out of here _alive_!"

Budo looked at the Jaeger for a few moments before he chuckled, the Great General closing his eyes for a few moments and wiping away another trail of blood going down his chin.

"I commend you on your efforts. You've shown great determination in the face of adversity...but, the end result will be the same." replied Budo before he held his arms out, the thunderstorm above picking up in strength and causing the winds to howl around them.

Before their very eyes, Budo began to levitate and float up into the sky with lightning bolts lancing all around him. It was if he had truly taken on the person of a Thunder God who shows no mercy to his enemies. He raised his arms up higher upon reaching the zenith of his ascent, even larger bolts of lightening beginning to strike and fuel his body and Teigu with their energy.

"Adramelech! Bring forth the thunder!" he proclaimed before a defeating boom echoed out from the clouds, Tatsumi squinting to see Budo within the furious lightning storm.

He held both arms out and the lightning surrounding them turning pitch black, their power increasing with every passing second. This was his Trump Card, the final attack that would wipe his enemies clean off the face of the earth.

"Accept your judgement! Solid Shooter!" he bellowed before firing a massive beam of black lighting right at the Jaegers.

Tatsumi, with the remaining strength he had left, stepped forward and held Neuntote sideways with both hands up towards the approaching beam. He already knew the words and what to do.

"Dragon Scale Layered Defense!" he said as a bright red ethereal barrier reminiscent of a dragon's hide appeared around him and the other Jaegers.

The beam struck the shield full force and he grunted from the sheer power of Budo's Trump Card, its offensive strength overwhelming. The barrier began to crack in some areas not even a minute after getting hit and the Jaegers braced themselves for the inevitable. Tatsumi only had to look back once to see Esdeath and the look she had on her face before he sucked in a breath and looked past the pain.

"I will not...fall!" he growled when a portion of the barrier above him broke away, allowing a small fraction of the beam to get past and pierce through his left shoulder.

He let out a final battle-cry and poured every single last ounce of power into maintaining and modifying the barrier's sections directly above his friends and Esdeath. A bright light consumed them when a large majority of the barrier failed, the beam finally striking the ground and exploding in a massive ball of lightning that covered the entire area with a blinding flash.

A few seconds later Budo let out ragged sigh as he ceased his attack and floated back down to the ground. He waited in silence for the smoke the beam's detonation had created to disperse, but he was thrown for a complete loop when after it finally did, somehow, someway, the Jaegers had managed to survive his Trump Card. All of the members were grouped together and surrounding them was a barely standing barrier that finally flickered and faded away, with Tatsumi coughing vigorously and dropping Neuntote.

" _My body feels like its on fire…_ " he thought as he stumbled slightly and hunched over, his armor fading away and revealing all of the injuries he had sustained.

"Tatsumi!" exclaimed Esdeath as she ran over to him despite her own pains and saved him from falling over out of exhaustion.

He felt her touch and he smiled weakly as he glanced at her with half-open eyes, Esdeath hoisting his arm over her shoulders to keep him on his feet. "I'm sorry...I think I overdid it a bit…"

"It's fine...just, please, don't scare me like that again." she whispered, Tatsumi looking at her and the worried look she had on her face and chuckling.

Budo, after overcoming his shock, crossed his arms and scowled at them again. "Even though you've all survived my Trump Card, you still cannot escape."

All of a sudden at least thirty Imperial Guards gathered around him alongside several platoons of Imperial Policemen carrying guns. Esdeath guessed he must've called them once he had freed himself from the coliseum and had them standing on by just in case.

"What do we do?" asked Kurome in a low tone as she raised up Yatsufusa and flinched, the effects of the toxious gas she had inhaled from earlier still affecting her, Solomon and Chelsea, with Run also weakened because he had gone to help them.

Tatsumi and Wave were in no condition to fight Budo, and Esdeath was nearing total exhaustion herself. Bols could see all of these factors clearly and upon realizing that he was the only one capable of taking on Budo and the guards, he sighed heavily and took a step forward.

"Captain, everyone, get out of here as fast as you can. I'll cover your escape." he said as he brought up Rubicante and aimed its nozzle towards the Great General.

"Bols, what are you doing?! You can't take on Budo alone!" shouted Wave from Solomon's arms.

Bols said nothing as he reached up with his free hand and untied the back of his mask, allowing it to fall away and reveal his face to everyone present. He turned and looked back at the Jaegers and smiled, his blonde hair and blue eyes a stark contrast to his grizzled appearance.

"Don't worry Wave, I'll be fine. Just promise me one thing." he said before looking back at the Great General and his forces, the nozzle of Rubicante beginning to heat up.

"What?" asked Tatsumi with a raspy breath, a single tear rolling down Bols' face.

"Protect my wife and daughter."

He pressed the trigger of Rubicante and out streamed a huge blast of fire that consumed nearly half of the Imperial Guards with Budo, the Great General growling. His anger only grew when he saw the rest of the Jaegers leap over the wall. "I won't allow you to escape!"

Before he could give chase he saw the flames from Rubicante come towards him and he rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding them. The Imperial Policemen that had survived the initial attack fired their guns at Bols and to their surprise he swung his flamethrower around and incinerated the bullets before they even got close to him.

"You'll have to get past me before you can go after my friends, Sir." said Budo with a straight face after dispatching of the policemen and the rest of the Imperial Guards, leaving only the Great General left.

"Very well." replied Budo before he rushed Bols, the Jaeger taking Rubicante and unleashing another stream of fire.

The Great General easily avoided the first blast and continued running right at him, Bols clenching his jaw as he shifted his stance slightly and aimed at Budo again. He avoided the flames of his Teigu again and leaped forward, Bols raising the flamethrower alongside the movement and letting loose one last stream of fire. Budo held up his arms and allowed the fires to consume and wrap around him, his body armor and gauntlets taking most of the blast and allowing him to push on without any major wounds.

He swung his fist and Bols grunted when Rubicante took a brunt of the blow and he skid back from the force. He looked down at his flamethrower and cursed under his breath when he saw that as a result of Budo's attack, Rubicante had been damaged and he couldn't utilize it any more.

" _Damn...I guess I have no choice. If I let Budo live, he'll just go after the Captain and the others._ " he thought before he glared at Budo and disconnected the hose connecting the flamethrower to the tank on his back.

Budo glared at him with a wary eye when Bols grasped the tank and placed it on the ground beside him, a trigger button appearing in his right hand. A single tear rolled down his cheek as he closed his eyes, the Great General immediately realizing what he planned to do and raising his arms up to kill him. When no lightning emerged from Adramelech, he cursed when the charge meter on the gauntlets flashed red.

" _Shit, they ran out of charge! I can't get away in time!_ "

" _Goodbye my wife and child...I wish...I wish you the best of happiness._ " thought Bols before he smiled and pressed the trigger, Budo's eyes widening as he brought his arm up when the fuel tank let out a blinding white light.

Already several miles out from the capital, Tatsumi, Esdeath and the others whipped their heads around when they heard a thunderous boom back from where they had come. They watched in sorrow when a massive mushroom cloud of fire and smoke rose up from the capital, the sight meaning only one thing.

"Bols...he detonated the fuel container for Rubicante…" uttered Kurome in almost a whisper.

They each lowered their heads and payed a silent tribute to their fallen comrade before they opened their eyes and looked away from their old home, the wide open frontier of the Empire now resting before them.

"I guess we're fugitives now, huh?" asked Solomon with a glance at Esdeath and Tatsumi.

"Yes. Let's focus on finding somewhere to set up camp." replied Esdeath when they began to move again, wanting to get as far away from the capital as possible.

While their backs were turned, the mushroom cloud that had been birthed as a result of Rubicante self-destructing had finally drifted away, revealing a grey wasteland of dust and broken stone that held no trace of Bols whatsoever. Over near the edge of the massive crater, however, rested a bloody Budo who had somehow managed to survive the explosion thanks to his heavily reinforced body armor. He was unable to move however, the concussive force the explosion had possessed causing every bone in his body to break.

He opened his eyes slightly and glanced around through the smoke clouds drifting around him, unsure about the presence of others. His question however was answered when he peered into the wall of grey and managed to make out a single distinct shadow

"Who's there?" he asked weakly, his eyesight still foggy.

The figure said nothing as it approached Budo and stopped a foot's length away from his broken body, the Great General looking up and blinking a few times to try and make out the person's identity. When his vision finally cleared up he could clearly see the sharpened end of a sword pointed right at his jugular, but more importantly the face of the person standing over him.

"You...what are you doing?!"

"Following orders. Goodnight...Great General Budo. Your services will no longer be required." replied the figure before he reared back and plunged the sword into Budo's neck.

The Great General sputtered a few times, blood emerging from his pursed lips as he struggled to breath before he finally let out one final, raspy breath and ceased any movement whatsoever. The figure looked over Budo for a few more seconds before he tossed aside the sword and retreated back into the smoke, saying nothing as he vanished from sight.

" _Mission accomplished._ "


	15. Heart of Darkness

A/N Uh oh...Budo got murdered, and the Jaegers now have become fugitives from the Empire. What's gonna happen now? And what about the Revolution currently taking place? With their Great General dead and the Empire's Strongest General now a traitor, the Empire's now stuck between a rock and a hard place. I wonder how they'll deal with it...khehehe...

On another note I have Budo's info and his Teigu's info done on the wiki. Just a reminder for those who wish for a proper image and description of the characters, especially the OCs, head over to and go to the section marked "A Different Path". Everything that deals with this story will be located in that. Okay, public service announcment done. Leave a fav and review

* * *

 **Chapter 14 - Heart of Darkness**

Three days had passed since the death of Great General Budo, and taking advantage of the situation the Revolutionary Army got a hold of the information and pressed their advantage, taking over several fortresses and castles in tandem with the Western Nations army and the Path of Peace in order to totally encircle the Empire. Even the Shisuikan fell due to the fact the Great General wasn't there to back up its forces.

As a result, Esdeath's army was pulled back to protect the capital and the Empire was left in quite the perilous position. They had lost the Jaegers, which consisted of a majority of their Teigu wielders, General Esdeath and the combat prowess she represented on the battlefield, and Great General Budo. How could they possibly recover?

"I can't believe Budo is dead. You have any idea who brought that geezer down?" asked Lubbock as he sat leisurely in the living room of their HQ, Gazia and Mine shrugging.

"I do."

They turned to the door just as Leone walked in with a somewhat confused expression on her face, Najenda and Akame right behind her. They waited for them to take their seats before Gazia asked the question they were all dying to know. "So, what's the word Boss?"

Najenda glanced over at him and covered her face with her hand, rubbing her eyebrows and sighing heavily. Clearly she was stressed.

"We found out who killed Budo and why security around the capital has gotten extremely tight." she said, Leone watching as Akame got uncomfortable seemed to hunker down within herself.

"It was a member of the Jaegers, the one with the flamethrower, Bols. He made his Teigu self-destruct and it caught Budo in the blast."

"One of the Jaegers? Hold up, now I'm confused. Why would one of the Empire's own kill Budo?" said Lubbock with a frown.

"And how could a single explosion kill him? He had to be wounded or crippled to the point he couldn't get away beforehand." said Mine to back up his statement.

"He was, quite severely actually. And the reason why Bols attacked him was because he was protecting his comrades." replied Najenda, Gazia crossing one of his legs over the other as he fixed his gaze on her and raised an eyebrow.

"Protecting his comrades? What do you mean?"

"Bols wasn't the only one to attack the Great General. All of the Jaegers went rogue...even Esdeath." stated Akame in a low tone.

Everyone in the room, even Susanoo, who was off in one of the corners with his eyes closed, turned their eyes to her and gaped in shock at the very idea, the very _thought_ , that General Esdeath would actually _betray_ the Empire. She was the Empire's Strongest, probably even stronger then Budo, and she goes rogue alongside an entire squad of Teigu users? Everything about that seemed extraordinarily fishy, and she didn't like it one bit.

"Wait, if everyone in the Jaegers went rogue, then that means…" started Leone before she came to a realization and she looked over at Lubbock and Mine. "That means Tatsumi went rogue too…"

"And Kurome…" spoke up Akame, who was still in disbelief since her little sister had been entirely loyal to the Empire.

There was no way she would just suddenly go rogue like that. There had to be a reason, it had to be a trick or something.

"Could...Could he still be on our side?" asked Mine in a hushed tone, the members of Night Raid falling silent when that same question they had all been asking themselves after his betrayal came back.

Najenda sighed again and lowered her gaze. "I have no idea if he's still on our side or not, and I have no idea why they had to flee the capital. There's only one way to figure out these questions, and we all know what that is."

"We have to find the Jaegers." stated Susanoo from across the room, Najenda solemnly nodding.

"Exactly. Our mission this time is not to assassinate a target. We will devote all of our resources into tracking down the Jaegers and figuring out the truth!"

 **\- Imperial Palace -**

 **\- Two Hours Later -**

"I believe I have our salvation's at hand, gentlemen." said Honest from where he stood beside the Emperor within the throne room, the other various Generals of the Empire's military and other political leaders assembled below him.

"What do you have in mind?" asked one, Honest fixing his gaze on him and smiling.

"Yes, it is indeed a great loss that we have endured, with the defection of General Esdeath and the Jaegers and the death of Great General Budo. However, I have knowledge of another who could possibly fill both of their positions."

"You're suggesting a replacement for the Great General, Prime Minister?" questioned the Emperor, Honest looking down at him and chuckling.

"Indeed, your highness. I'll have someone go and fetch her." he said before calling over an Imperial Guard standing close to the throne and ordering him to go after their potential candidate.

After he left the throne room and when the Emperor turned back around, Honest's smile turned evil and maniacal when he thought back to when he first saw the very person he was calling.

" _Oh, she'll definitely be able to fill Esdeath and Budo's spot. She's just as powerful then them, if not even more powerful. And what's even better is that she's well-versed in torture just like Esdeath, probably even better at it. Khehehe...they don't call her Jack the Ripper for nothing._ "

 **\- Capital District Building No. 23, Reconditioning Department -**

The Imperial Guard sent by Honest arrived at the ominous building and entered into its depths, gulping out of nervousness when he the screams of agony from the unfortunate souls reached his ears. Rather then quake in his shoes and show fear, he paid no attention to them and focused on accomplishing his task as soon as he arrived within the infamous torture chambers the building contained, walking past every kind of heinous device available on his way to the back portion of the massive space.

He came to a fairly small metal box situated in a corner of the large room and he spotted a tall lanky man leaning against the wall beside it with his arms crossed and his eyes closed. The man was dressed like a gentlemen, with the top hat, suit vest, bow tie and all. He even possessed a monocle over his right eye. The guard thought he was asleep, but that quickly went out the window because he shifted slightly and adjusted his position against the wall while sniffing.

"Is she available?" asked the guard, the man cracking open an eye and observing him.

"My Mistress usually doesn't like to be disturbed when she's inside. Why are you here?"

"Prime Minister Honest has summoned her to the Imperial Palace." replied the guard, the man closing his eye again and shrugging.

"I think you'll be fine. Proceed. Just don't be surprised at what you'll see."

" _You think?_ " thought the guard before he approached the sealed metal door and raised a fist up, gulping again before he rapped his knuckles three times and stepped back half a foot.

Whatever had been going on inside the metal box must've stopped because he heard the faint sound of someone approaching the door and unlock whatever sort of mechanism that kept it shut from the other side.

The door swung inward and the guard's eyes nearly popped out of his helmet when the person he was looking for stepped out into the doorway and leaned up against one side of the frame with a raised eyebrow, her expression less then pleased. She was a couple of inches shorter then him, at least 5'11, she was around 21 years old, and she had auburn hair that reached her lower back. What had caused him to be so taken aback though was that she was completely _naked_ , and she was using her other arm to hide her breasts.

"What?" she snapped, the Imperial Guard coming out of his trance and standing at attention.

"Sorry to disturb you ma'am, but Prime Minister Honest has requested your presence at the Imperial Palace. It's imperative that you arrive as soon as possible."

The woman's eyes brightened up and she smiled, the guard flinching somewhat when she ran her other hand that wasn't occupied across the edge of his helmet. "Oh, is that all? Thank you for telling me, now run along now and go tell the Prime Minister I'll be there in a few."

The guard nodded and was about to walk away before she grabbed his shoulder tightly and looked him straight in the eyes, her yellow and purple eyes causing him to feel uncomfortable. Even for her small stature he could feel that this person, whoever she was, is someone that no person in their right mind would trifle with. The look in her eyes, the grin on her face, everything about her just screamed "get the fuck away now".

"Also, just for you as a reminder. I don't like to be interrupted, so next time this happens...I'll _rip_ out your intestines and strangle you with them." said the woman with a smile, the guard shuddering and quickly nodding.

She let go and he quickly walked away to deliver her reply to Honest, the woman glancing at the tall man for a few seconds before she closed the metal door and locked it tight again. Once she was back inside the confines of the metal box, she licked her lips and turned back around while dropping her arm from her chest.

"Sorry to keep you waiting...now where were we?" she asked huskily as she slowly walked towards a metal operating table situated in the center of the room, swaying her hips left and right the entire way there.

Sitting on the table was another naked woman with her legs spread out and a bright red blush on her face as a result of being in the position. The auburn-haired woman climbed up onto the table and crawled on her hands and knees until she was over top the other woman, their breasts pressed up against one another.

"We'll make this quick, okay? I have to go somewhere."

"Okay…" replied the other woman in almost a whisper before their lips met.

Five minutes passed by and the lanky man pushed himself off the wall he was leaning on and crossed his arms when the metal door opened and out walked the two women, the auburn-haired one strolling over to him while the other left with a thankful smile on her face. When they had finished the auburn-haired girl had taken the time to get dressed in a unique-looking black and red dress with matching stockings, black heels and a black trench coat.

"I presume everything went well?" asked the man as he watched the unknown woman exit the torture chamber.

"Yes, my beloved subordinate, today was indeed a good day." replied the auburn-haired woman before her warm smile morphed into a psychopathic grin. "If she hadn't been so good...I would've cut open her throat. But that's beside the point. Let's go meet with the Prime Minister."

 **\- Imperial Palace -**

 **\- Fifteen Minutes Later -**

"Sir, they've arrived." spoke an Imperial Guard as he entered into the throne room and stood off on the side, the pair of Faceless opening the doors to allow entry for the tall lanky man and the auburn-haired woman.

Prime Minister Honest, the Emperor, and the other assembled Generals watched as they walked down the aisle and came to a stop a few feet away from the throne when they kneeled before them.

"Your highness, I present to you Miss Jacqueline and her subordinate, the God of Death." said Honest with a grin as he extended a hand out to them, the auburn-haired woman smiling as she looked up at the Emperor.

"It's a pleasure to finally have your acquaintance, your Highness." said Jacqueline while the God of Death said nothing and merely nodded. "And I would also like to point out that he no longer goes by the name "God of Death". From now on, refer to him as the Inquisitor."

"Of course, Miss Jacqueline." said the Emperor, his eyes turning back to Honest. "Shall we tell her the reason why we summoned her?"

"Indeed, your Highness." he replied before he looked down at Jacqueline and the Inquisitor and chuckled. "Both of you have heard of the unfortunate death of Great General Budo and the defection of the Jaegers, correct?"

Jacqueline nodded and she feigned wiping a tear from her eye. "Yes, it was quite horrible how they would turn their back on the Empire like that. I wonder why the assassination teams aren't already trying to hunt them down?"

"You can figure that out for yourself because as of now, I formerly promote you to the position of Great General."

Jacqueline's eyes shot wide open and her heart skipped a beat, the sudden promotion causing her to feel light-headed. "Really?"

"Yes. The Prime Minister has spoke highly of you and the Inquisitor, so it would be a perfect fit for you." explained the Emperor with a warm smile, Jacqueline lowering her head and bowing to show her gratitude.

"I cannot possibly accept such an honor, your Highness."

"I agree on that statement…" muttered one of the other Generals present under his breath, thinking that it wouldn't be heard.

He was wrong. The Inquisitor perked up and he stood up suddenly, the Prime Minister and the Emperor watching in bewilderment as he turned and faced towards the General who spoke even though his eyes were still closed. "Mistress, that man doubts your abilities."

Jacqueline's smile faltered for a second and she stood up as well, slowly turning until her eyes came to rest on the General the Inquisitor was pointing at. The left corner of her smile twitched and she asked, "Oh? You think I wouldn't be able to fill the shoes of the late Budo _and_ that traitor Esdeath?"

The General gulped in terror when she released an intoxicating amount of killer intent, her unnerving smile making him feel incredibly uncomfortable. While Jacqueline stared the man down, Honest couldn't help but smirk as he watched the man struggle to speak under the watch of the head torturer of the capital.

" _This is going to be interesting…_ "

"Go ahead and speak your mind. We're all friends here, right?" asked Jacqueline, the General nodding his head quickly before he nervously cleared his throat, his colleagues staring at him in utter silence.

"I-I just don't believe you would be a suitable replacement since you've mainly spent your time in the torture chambers and you don't possess a Teigu."

Jacqueline registered the information and she placed a hand on her hip, the Inquisitor cracking open an eye and chuckling when he sensed the change in attitude within her. Things were about to get exciting.

"Ah, of course. I would probably say the same thing. Only...you're _dead_ wrong. I in fact have plenty of battle experience, since I formerly served in the Imperial Army, and about a Teigu...I possess _two_." stated Jacqueline with a slight giggle, the other Generals gasping at her claim.

"Two?! That's impossible! No one can dual wield Teigu!" stammered the General, but Jacqueline merely shook her head.

"You aren't thinking. One is standing right at my side in the form of my beloved Inquisitor." she said, her smile slowly slipping and turning into a scowl that matched her insane glare. "And right now, with you acting so ignorantly...you need to be taught a lesson."

"If I were you...I would run." stated the Inquisitor as he motioned towards the door, the two Faceless guarding it immediately getting out of the way when they understood what he meant.

The nervous General looked left and right at his colleagues before he bolted for the doors, wanting to get out of the throne room as fast as possible. Unfortunately for him, Jacqueline wasn't going to let him.

"Inquisitor! Cripple!" she ordered, the Inquisitor's eyes shooting wide open.

"Of course, Mistress." he replied calmly as he pulled off his Teigu, Brahmastra, from his back and looked down the scope for a fraction of a second before firing two quick shots.

The bolts of pure plasma shot through the man's kneecaps and he collapsed to the ground, crying out in pain. The Inquisitor closed his eyes once again and shouldered Brahmastra, the Emperor and Prime Minister watching as Jacqueline slowly approached the fallen General and walked around him so he could look right at her. She bent down until her eyes were level with his and she smiled, the man's eyes as wide as the moon and swimming with terror.

"And about my second Teigu…" she said before her eyes flicked upward at the Emperor. "Your Highness, I would recommend you look away."

The boy raised an eyebrow and remained where he sat, adamant in that he would continue to watch, so Jacqueline shrugged and returned her attention to the quivering General sitting before her.

"My Teigu...its name is Demonic Savagery: Devil's Heart. It's beating inside me as I speak, next to my own heart. Listen…" she said as she reached down and grabbed one of the man's hands so she could place it on her skin right above her cleavage.

The entire room grew silent and the man's eyes widened in horror when he felt not one beat, but _two_ come from inside her. She was speaking the truth. There was indeed a second heart inside her, and while he was transfixed on the phenomenon Jacqueline's entire demeanor and posture had changed and she was grinning madly from ear to ear.

"And it's ability is quite unique…but you don't deserve to see it" she said in almost a whisper before, to everyone's shock and disgust, she gripped his right hand tightly at the wrist and with sheer strength alone she ripped it off.

The man screamed as he withdrew the bloody stump that used to be his hand and tucked it close to his chest, Jacqueline giggling like a schoolgirl as she tossed aside the hand and reached inside one of her trench coat's pockets, rummaging around in its deep expanse for a few seconds before her fingers wrapped around something unseen. What she retrieved was a freshly sharpened knife and she twirled it around through her fingers, her eyes transfixed on the man as he whimpered and began to inch away from her.

"I hope you've learned your lesson." said Jacqueline before, to everyone's shock, she brought her right arm around and slashed through the man's entire neck with the knife.

A sputter and a gasp emerged from behind the man's lips before he fell backwards, his head rolling off his neck and coming to a stop a few feet away while blood gushed out from his severed neck like a water fountain. To make the experience even worse, Jacqueline brought her hand up and licked the blood clean off of the knife, giggling the entire time, before returning it to the pocket from which it came.

"For my first action as Great General, I'll be taking direct command of the Imperial Guard, Esdeath's army and the army belonging to our late friend here." stated Jacqueline as wiped away some blood that had gotten onto her cheek. "With me in command, you won't have to worry about the Empire's enemies any longer, your Highness."

She turned and approached the doors leading out of the throne room, the Inquisitor at her side in a heartbeat, but before she could leave Honest chuckled and called out, "You have my permission to use whatever means necessary, General. Show them it was a grave mistake for them to challenge the Empire."

She smiled manically as she pushed one of the doors open and glared back at everyone in the room, replying, "Of course, Prime Minister. Anyone who stands in my way will be murdered."

With that she left with the Inquisitor in tow, her mind already at work planning on how she'll take down the quickly advancing Revolutionary Army, Western Nations' army and the Path of Peace. After thinking about it for a few seconds she made the decision to wait until later, her interests going elsewhere.

"Was it really necessary to kill that man?" asked the Inquisitor as they exited the Imperial Palace, Jacqueline looking up at him with a blank expression.

"Of course it was. Do you think he didn't deserve it?" she asked.

"He did, my Mistress. He insulted your abilities and received punishment." replied the Inquisitor in a monotone voice, Jacqueline's frown turning back into a smile as a result.

"What's our next course of action?" asked the Inquisitor while adjusting his top hat, the newly promoted Great General grinning evilly as she pushed back a strand of her hair.

"You can take a break for today and return to your quarters, my Inquisitor. I, on the other hand, will be taking care of a certain _problem_ that needs to be addressed."

 **\- Capital District Building No. 13 -**

 **\- Fifteen Minutes Later -**

Jacqueline placed a hand on her hip as she stopped and gazed up at a large, inconspicuous looking brick building near the outskirts of the capital, a smirk on her face. She knew exactly what purpose it served, since the building was built in the exact same manner as the one the Reconditioning Department was housed in.

She approached the double doors offering entrance into the building and pushed them both inward, stepping into the dark interior and looking around into the black. She could feel the presence of several individuals standing beyond the wall of darkness, so instead of continuing further she crossed her arms and grinned.

"I know you're all in here...you might as well show yourself. Besides, it's unbecoming of you to keep Budo's replacement waiting in the dark." she announced into the darkness, a few moments of silence passing by before the lights all came on at once.

Jacqueline's grin widened when, as a result of the building's interior becoming illuminated, she could now perfectly see the three men standing in the center of the expanse next to a stairway going down into the ground, no doubt to the hidden lower levels the building hid.

One of the men was obviously younger then the other two, with short and spiky whitish-blond hair and golden eyes and an outfit consisting of a long trench coat with gold epaulets and a suit underneath. The middle-aged man on the left with blonde hair and green eyes wore nothing but a white shirt, red scarf and black pants, and the bald one on the right wore a white cloak with a flared collar and white pants.

"Budo's replacement, eh? Who might you be?" asked the man on the left as he crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow.

"My name is Jacqueline, the head torturer for the Reconditioning Department. It's a pleasure to meet you all, Gozuki, head of the Elite Seven, Najasho, Chief of the Elite Seven, and Barraka, head of the Group of Terror." said Jacqueline as she bowed slightly, the three men returning the gesture.

"What brings you here, General?" asked Barraka with a slight smirk, Jacqueline's eyes narrowing a fraction of an inch before she strolled forward and shrugged slightly.

"I just wanted to ask a question…"

Suddenly her gaze turned dead cold and her eyes widened as if she just lost every last ounce of her sanity, the three men stiffening when they all felt her noxious blood lust. " _Why_ haven't you attempted to hunt down the Jaegers?"

Gozuki gulped and looked over at Barraka, who shared his current feelings about the situation. The two assassination group leaders returned their gazes to Jacqueline and when they gave her no answer, her lips curled upward into a malicious smile and she sighed.

"Very well. I see no other reason to keep your organizations around anymore." she said as she shrugged off her trench coat and rolled around her shoulders, Gozuki and Barraka taking a step back and bracing themselves when her blood lust intensified ten fold.

Neither of them had ever felt nor experienced a killer intent as vile as hers. It was so powerful that it was starting to make it hard to *breath, the two assassins coughing and rubbing the base of their throats a few seconds later.

"Najasho, round up the others and get out of here as fast as possible!" ordered Gozuki, the young man standing behind him quickly descending the stairs next to him.

As soon as he vanished from sight, Jacqueline began to giggle and laugh like someone had just said a joke and she had found it amusing.

"What's so funny?" asked Barraka, Jacqueline halting suddenly and fixating her cold stare on him.

"Sorry, but...none of you are escaping. I sealed all of the escape passageways you two built as a means to get out of the building before coming here." she said, the bald man gasping as an entirely new sense of terror gripped his heart.

"You intended to kill us all from the start…?"

"But of course. You failed to jump on the opportunity to kill the traitors when they were most vulnerable." stated Jacqueline just as her psychotic smile returned. "For that, as punishment...I'm going to kill all of you."

Gozuki clenched his jaw muscles and silently wished that he still possessed Murasame before he shook aside the thought and grinned as he removed the scarf from around his neck. "Have you forgotten who I am?"

Jacqueline raised an eyebrow in confusion, the question catching her somewhat off guard. "What, that you used to be a member of the Four Rakshasa Demons before you left and founded the Elite Seven?"

"Do you really think you can take me so lightly?" asked Gozuki while Barraka unsheathed the katana hanging around his waist and held it backhanded.

"Being a former Rakshasa Demon won't matter. The end result will be the same." replied Jacqueline before she bolted right for Barraka, wanting to kill him first since he was the weakest according to her analysis.

The man swung his sword out at lightning fast speeds and Jacqueline dropped to her knees, easily avoiding the swing, while she rammed her fist into his left knee cap and grinned when it snapped loudly. Barraka dropped to one knee and she was about to get up behind and snap his neck before Gozuki's arm extended out and smashed his hand into her throat, shooting her back and until he pinned her up against the wall.

A small trickle of blood emerged from the corner of her mouth and she laughed. "I think that tickled a little…"

Gozuki narrowed his eyes and hid his surprise behind his usual cold expression, his hand and arm returning to its normal length at his side after he brought it back. " _How is she still able to speak, let alone breath? That blow alone should've crushed her trachea._ "

All of a sudden Barraka ran from his side towards Jacqueline with his sword at his side, his mind completely oblivious to the broken knee after he just ingested a small pill he had in his pocket. Jacqueline grinned madly as she ducked and side-stepped every swing and stab he made with his sword to try and injure her before, like a light switch, he grinned and pressed his hand against her abdomen. Jacqueline's grin faltered slightly when a hidden blade popped out from his sleeve and stabbed through her skin into her stomach before he swept his hand to the left and slashed his way out, leaving a deep gash in her side and spraying her blood all across the floor.

"You underestimated me. One should not do that when facing a seasoned assassin, Great General." he said before he reared his arm back and ran her through with the sword in an area he knew would cause her to die in a matter of minutes.

Jacqueline hacked out blood as she stumbled back, the sword still embedded in between her ribcage. She could feel her punctured lung start to fill up with blood and she coughed vigorously to expel some of it.

"Good job. Landing a blow on me takes some skill...or in your case, performance-enhancing drugs." she said with a smile as Barraka retracted the hidden knife in his sleeve and crossed his arms. "To think that I would have to use my Teigu…"

"Y-Your Teigu?" asked Gozuki when she returned to her full height and popped her neck, her fingers wrapping around the hilt of the katana.

She grunted as she slid the blade out through the wound and tossed it aside, her grin still present before the blood suddenly started to sizzle and evaporate, the wound itself alongside the gash in her side surprisingly beginning to heal themselves. In a matter of seconds they were gone with the wind, as if she had never been stabbed in the first place.

In the blink of an eye Jacqueline grabbed Barraka by the throat and lifted him up into the air with a single arm, her super-human strength easily surpassing his drug-enhanced abilities. He struggled to break free before he gasped when a pasty white shaft exploded out from the back of his neck, its origin none other then Jacqueline's hand. When he ceased all movement she tossed his corpse aside and held up the hand she had used to grip his throat with, Gozuki experiencing a chill when he saw the almost bone-like protrusion sticking out from a tear in her skin.

"Is that something your Teigu can do…?" questioned Gozuki as Jacqueline licked the blood off the shaft and retracted it back into her arm, her hand healing itself afterwards.

"Yes...yes it is. It enables me to heal any injury I sustain and regenerate lost limbs." she started as she raised her arm up and held an open hand over her right shoulder.

To Gozuki's horror and disgust the skin underneath her hand ripped open and out protruded a white bone that looked like the handle of _some_ sort of blade. His suspicion proved correct when she grabbed onto the bone and pulled out, literally from her _shoulder_ , a blade that had to be at least a foot and a half long. As soon as the blade's tip left her shoulder the skin repaired itself like nothing had happened, Jacqueline grinning when she pointed the bone sword straight at him.

"And it allows me to manipulate my skeletal system's growth to whatever liking I choose. I can create blades from my own bones and increase their strength to the point that even Extase would have difficulty cutting through them. I rarely showcase this ability to anyone, so count yourself lucky that you got to see it before you die...Gozuki."

 **\- Capital District Building No. 13, Lower Levels -**

"Najasho, please tell me what's going on! Why are the exits blocked?!" shouted Poney, another member of the Elite Seven, as they sprinted through one of the many hallways of the underground section of their headquarters on their way to the central training room on their way back from the southeastern escape passageway.

He didn't respond as they flew into the room and found the other members of the Elite Seven standing in the middle of the room with disgruntled looks on their faces.

"No luck with the others either?" asked Najasho, Green and Tsukushi shaking their heads.

"Not at all. They were sealed shut. What about you Kahfka?" asked Green with a glance at their newest member standing next to Gin, formerly the Group of Terror's last remaining member before she was transferred over to the Elite Seven.

She was dressed in a grey sleeveless hoodie with the zipper pulled down to her stomach, revealing her cleavage, black skin-tight pants and matching pairs of arm and leg warmers colored white. She looked up and stared at Najasho with green eyes before she slowly shook her head.

"No, the exits Gin and I looked at were also sealed."

"Care to explain? Najasho?" asked Poney again, the leader sighing heavily before he crossed his arms.

"It could've only been her...dammit!"

" _Her_? Who are you talking about?" questioned Tsukushi worriedly.

"The new Great General, Budo's replacement. Her name is Jacqueline, and she came here a few minutes ago and talked with Gozuki and Barraka. She came here to kill us." replied Najasho with a cold stare at her, the Elite Seven members gasping.

"Kill us? Why?"

"Because we didn't go after the rogue Jaegers after they defeated Budo soon enough. And I can only assume that before coming here she closed off all of the exits so we couldn't escape."

Green gulped nervously when he realized that the only way out now would be through the Great General herself, which would prove to be an arduous task even for them considering she holds the highest military rank within the Empire.

"I wish Kurome hadn't gone and left, she would be a great help right about now…" muttered Grin as she rubbed her temples to try and relieve some stress.

"What are we going to do?" asked Kahfka when Najasho turned away from them and rubbed his chin in deep thought, his mind working furiously to try and figure out a plan of action against Jacqueline.

Unfortunately he didn't have time when all of a sudden the lights shut off, plunging the training room and the rest of the underground compound into complete darkness. The emergency power came back on and they were bathed with a dim red glow from the few lights the room offered. The feeling of terror they all shared got even worse when they heard the faint sound of footsteps slowly approaching them from the adjoining hallway, their gazes all turning towards it and the dark shadow at its end.

The footsteps got closer and closer and they all took several paces back when, to their horror, Jacqueline appeared out of the black abyss covered in blood and with the heads of Barraka and Gozuki in her grasp. With an insane giggle she tossed them into the room and watched as they rolled up to Najasho's feet, a trail of blood left behind. His heart skipped a beat as he gazed down at the shocked expressions plastered on them, the two assassin leader's final moments immortalized in blood as a result. He looked back up at the person who had killed them and he lost all feeling in his legs when he saw that Jacqueline was still giggling like a mad man.

"I hope your reputation as the Elite Seven is actually worthwhile...those two broke too early." she said with a pout before the red lights flickered for a few seconds and finally shut off entirely, the only thing the Elite Seven members could see now being Jacqueline's glowing eyes.

It was the last thing most of them would see. In a matter of minutes, Jacqueline ripped through the Elite Seven with her bone swords and cast their blood all over the walls and floor of the training room. Whenever the red lights would flicker back on for a second, the remaining survivors would just get a glimpse of the gruesome scene around them, and when they would plunge them back into darkness, the screams resumed once again. Soon, Jacqueline stood up and licked the blood off her fingers after stabbing Green in the jugular before turning around and glaring at the only survivor left...Kahfka.

The emergency power lights came back on and she saw all of her friends on the ground, massacred. They were all drowning in pools of blood, and standing in the center of a lake that had accumulated as a result was Jacqueline herself. She was still holding her bone sword and she was smiling evilly, her blood lust radiating off her skin like some vile toxin that could poison anything.

"You...you're new, aren't you?" she asked while she walked towards Kahfka, the assassin stepping back until she hit the wall. "Funny how you lived...and everyone else died."

"Fuck you." snarled Kahfka while she scanned the room for any sign of her Shingu.

"It's no use." said Jacqueline when she figured out what Kahfka was trying to do. "Fighting me won't do you any good. You'll die regardless."

"I don't care. At least I would die trying like my friends." she retorted, Jacqueline raising an eyebrow out of intrigue for her determination.

"You would fight knowing that you would die?"

Kahfka hunkered down and wiped the blood away from her lips as she got ready to fight Jacqueline with her fists. The Great General was right, she probably wouldn't stand a chance against her and that weird ability of hers, but not doing anything would be an insult to Najasho and the others.

To her shock, however, instead of moving in for the kill, Jacqueline's insane smile returned to a more normal looking one and she dropped her bone sword. "I admire your determination and your will to live...maybe that's why you were able to live the longest."

"What are you doing?" asked Kahfka, still confused as to why she hadn't killed her yet.

"I've decided against killing you. I want you to become my student, my pupil. I can teach you anything you want to know and more. All you need to do is come with me." offered Jacqueline by extending a hand out towards Kahfka, the assassin looking at her outstretched hand with a baffled look.

"Why should I? You killed all of my friends."

"You lived because you were stronger then them. They were weak, and they died because of this. What I'm offering you is the chance to become even stronger then what you could have been if you had stayed as a member of the Elite Seven." explained Jacqueline as she stepped closer to Kahfka, her hand still outstretched.

Kahfka looked at it for a few more seconds and then back up at Jacqueline's sincere smile, the apparent insanity she was broadcasting earlier as she cut down and murdered her friends now gone. It was wrong to accept the Great General's offer, and she knew it. How could she betray her friends and join the very person that murdered them?

Unfortunately for her, another side of her inner psyche however had begun to like the idea of getting even stronger. It was probably because of how she worded it, but learning from the Great General would prove to be the best possible way to become even more powerful, especially since she had just eliminated the Elite Seven's leader, a former Rakshasa Demon and master assassin, in a matter of minutes.

With these two sides of her waging war inside of her to determine what she wanted to do, she didn't even see Jacqueline's lips move as she said something else. "W-What?"

"My offer still stands. Do you want to be at my side and learn under me?" asked Jacqueline again, Kahfka biting her lip and delving back into her thoughts to decide the victor or her internal battle.

Five minutes later Jacqueline emerged from the underground compound back into the empty building above, the headless corpses of Gazuki and Barraka just a few feet away from the staircase. She turned around and held out an arm to Kahfka as she appeared, wrapping it around her shoulder and leading her to the exit.

When she pushed open the doors she was pleasantly surprised to find the Inquisitor waiting for them with his arms crossed and his eyes closed. "So I see you didn't take my advice?"

"I apologize my Mistress, but I couldn't bring myself to be away from your side. And of course I knew that you would come here, so I ensured that the Imperial Police would come by later and shut down the building after you had finished your business." replied the Inquisitor honestly before he sensed Kahfka's presence and cracked open an eyelid.

"And who might this young woman be?"

"My name's Kahfka. Who are you?" asked Kahfka with a wary glance at the Inquisitor's Glasgow smile.

"Kahfka, this is my most trusted subordinate, the Inquisitor. He was an assassin just like you before he became my bodyguard, so you two should get along well." said Jacqueline, Kahfka's expression brightening up once she learned he was just like her.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Kahfka."

"You too, I guess." she replied back, the Inquisitor nodding before he walked over and stood at Jacqueline's side as they left the headquarters of the now… _defunct_ Elite Seven.

They returned to the Reconditioning Department and Kahfka was treated to the horrors that took place underneath the metal box of a building, but to be honest, after her initial reaction upon walking into the extensive torture chamber she quickly got used to the sights and sounds happening all around her and she learned to ignore them. Jacqueline was the first to notice this change and she grinned slightly while she walked ahead of her and the Inquisitor to look upon a strange looking torture device sitting unused off on the side.

"Part of your teaching will take place here, in the torture chamber. I'll show you every method I know as the head torturer down here." she explained as they walked around the central pit area towards the very back of the chamber, Kahfka spotting a small metal box situated in the far corner.

Once they arrived there the Inquisitor took up his normal spot on the wall nearest to the box that acted as Jacqueline's "office", only instead of leaning up against his he pulled over a small stool and sat down while while tipping his top hat forward so as to take a small nap. Jacqueline noticed a note taped onto the door and she quickly pulled it off, reading over it and silently murmuring under her breath before she smiled and crumpled up the paper.

"And it seems you'll get to see what exactly my job is down here. But for now, let's wait inside and go over everything that I'll be teaching you in greater detail and answer any questions you may have."

"Yeah, I was meaning to ask something about that. What exactly do you do in _here_? Why do you have a separate area off from the main chamber?" asked Kahfka as she ran her hand over the seamless metal face of the box.

Jacqueline laughed slightly as she opened the door and beckoned her to step inside, Kahfka following with a doubtful and worried expression into the darkened room. "You'll find out soon enough. For now, we need to prepare for the arrival of some guests..."


	16. Outlaws

A/N And yay, I finally got to introduce my two favorite OCs that I created for this story. The Inquisitor, a.k.a the God of Death, and the newly appointed Great General Jacqueline. I already have their profiles up on the wiki, which you can find if search FanficCollective on Google, then you go to the section titled "A Different Path" where all of the stuff for this story is, so that you guys can see them for yourselves. And I'm going to go ahead and say this right now, from this point on, if you hadn't noticed from the last chapter, things are about to get a whole lot more fucked up in this story, hence the M rating. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 15 - Outlaws**

 **\- The Badlands, Southern Region of the Empire -**

 **\- 9:00 a.m -**

The Badlands, an uncharted area of craggy rocks, mountains and canyons that housed all sorts of reptilian Danger Beasts. It took up a majority of the Southern Region of the Empire and was close by to the location of the village formerly occupied by the now extinct Ban Tribe. This place would serve as the temporary home for the Jaegers until they could find a more suitable location.

Currently the rogue organization had taken refuge within a small cave sheltered beneath an outcropping on the face of a large canyon since it had begun to pour down rain outside, and as soon as they had got there Solomon got to work on their injuries by using his special Phoenix blood. He had never tried it before on another person, but it turned out that if someone else ingested his blood it would be able to heal any injury they sustained, so in just a matter of minutes Wave's back had been fixed and everyone else had been returned to proper condition.

But now with that problem out of the way, nothing could stop them from grieving over the loss of Bols. He had given up his life to help them escape the wrath of Budo, and judging by how they hadn't been pursued by the Great General...he must've succeeded. They were all sitting around a small campfire, their shadows flickering off the walls of the cave behind them, with their heads lowered in silent mourning.

Finally though Wave, who could no longer bear the silence, coughed lightly and glanced around at everyone with a half-hearted smile. "So...I guess we're outlaws now, huh?"

"You'll get used to the feeling. This is pretty much what my entire life has been." said Solomon with a sigh as he leaned back against the cave wall.

"Still...Bols, he…" uttered Chelsea, her knees hiding her face when she pulled her legs up to her chest.

"He was a valued comrade and a good friend." stated Run, each Jaeger solemnly nodding in agreement. "I'm sure any one of us would've done the same thing in that situation."

Esdeath closed her eyes and after another minute of dead silence she reached up and pulled off the cap she had grown so accustomed to wearing and grinned slightly when she recalled all of the battles she had partaken in with it. The memories soon passed and she sighed, Tatsumi glancing over at her when she looked at the fire.

"Everything okay?" he asked while he wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

Esdeath rested her head on his shoulder and snuggled up next to him for comfort while she continued to look at her cap and think of her past.

"Yeah...it's just that now, I'm not going to need this anymore. I'm no longer a General of the Empire, so this means nothing to me." she replied before, to everyone's surprise, she tossed the cap into the fire to let it burn away into ash.

Visibly it was Esdeath just throwing away her cap that she had worn for pretty much most of her tenure as a General, but the symbolic meaning that it held was simply astounding. With the cap's cremation she had finally accepted the reality that her previous life was now well and truly over, and there was no going back. As a result, the other Jaegers began to come to to grips with their own situation as well.

"We're not going to be able to go back...aren't we?" asked Kurome in almost a whisper.

"No...not for a long time, at least." said Run with a sigh. "Like Wave had stated, we're outlaws now. Rogues. The Empire will most definitely be hunting us down after what we did at the coliseum."

"Which is why we need to find a better place to lay low for a while and figure out a way on how we can get back to the capital and finish what we started." said Tatsumi as he leaned forward and rested his hands on his legs when he crossed them over to sit in a more proper position.

Everyone looked at him and after a few seconds of silence Chelsea remembered a question he had asked of him as they were fleeing from the coliseum when she looked at his eyes and saw the cross-slit pupil present in both eyes instead of just one like before.

"Well now that we've gotten past the awkward silence stage, can we finally know why Incursio looked different and why both of your eyes looks like Tyrant's?" she asked, Tatsumi raising an eyebrow and chuckling.

"Oh yeah, right." he replied as he ran a hand through his hair and grinned. "I guess the first thing I should say is Tyrant isn't really around any more."

"Isn't around any more? What do you mean?" asked Wave, Tatsumi pointing to his eyes and opening them wider so they could all see them better.

"Tyrant isn't here now because to give me that extra power boost to take on Budo, he and I fused together into one. Before it was just Incursio that had been fused to me, but now its Tyrant himself who's a part of me now, meaning that I'm just like the Lord from the Path of Peace. Half human, half Danger Beast."

"Half human and half Danger Beast…" uttered Run in total disbelief, the other Jaegers just as surprised.

The thought of being half Danger Beast was almost unbelievable, and the Lord had been the only special case. But now, apparently due to Tyrant having fused himself to Tatsumi, their comrade had been the second person to cross the boundary between the normal and abnormal. He looked normal enough, and the only thing that hinted to this supposed fusion were his eyes. And even though they didn't show it they were thankful that he had retained his human appearance because it would be uncomfortable to see him with horns and scales instead of regular skin.

Tatsumi could see the doubt on their faces and he chuckled again. "I know it may be hard to believe, but it's the truth. Before, when it was just Incursio fused with me, I could hear Tyrant talk to me in my head to offer advice and such. But now, I can't hear, let alone sense his presence any more."

"If he really did fuse himself _and_ Incursio to you, then where's the key at?" asked Wave, Tatsumi glancing over at him before he raised up his right hand and showed him the back of his palm.

Wave gasped when he saw the tattoo of a dragon's head roaring etched into the skin, undoubtedly referring to the Danger Beast Incursio had been forged from.

"The Key's gone. To show that a person is its wielder, this mark will appear on their hand. And the Teigu isn't named Demon Armor: Incursio any more. It's Demon Dragon's Flesh: Tyrannus now." stated Tatsumi as he lowered his hand.

"Oh, right."

"And of course, if I need to, I can defuse the Teigu from myself if I needed to into a new key. That was the last thing Tyrant told me before he completed the fusion."

Wave nodded and shrugged, seemingly accepting the idea instead of trying to deny it any longer. The other Jaegers remained quiet as well and only nodded to show their satisfaction upon learning the reason behind his Teigu's transformation and they returned to staring into the fire sitting in the center of their circle. They still needed time to get over Bols' death.

 **\- The Next Day -**

 **\- Capital District Building No. 23, Reconditioning Department -**

In only two days, Kahfka had gotten used to the screams of pain she would always hear when she entered the metal box of a building that had become her new home away from home. She had seen a lot of death when she had been on missions within the Elite Seven, and had wizened up to the idea of ending another person's life fairly quickly.

But now that Jacqueline has taken her in as a pupil of sorts, she's been exposed to a whole new world that lives underneath the capital. She's learned every torture method the Great General knows and has gotten to experience it first hand when they had received a group of Imperial soldiers who had tried to defect from the Empire. What Jacqueline did to them was, to say the least, straight out of a nightmare.

And it only got worse when she left one of them, a woman probably just entering her twenties, alive so that she could be dragged into Jacqueline's "office" and strapped down to the operating table inside. That's when she started to have the "fun" she had talked about earlier while they were waiting. The woman, before her very eyes, was stripped naked and the Great General followed suite before having her way with the woman.

And it wasn't like Kahfka was forced to watched Jacqueline pleasure herself and satisfy her sexual desires, she could've looked away if she wanted to. Nothing was stopping her. Only...she couldn't bring herself to. To be perfectly honest, she was mesmerized by the sight of Jacqueline's naked body, her eyes taking in her perfect skin and voluptuous curves. She was beautiful in every sense of the word, and the more she continued to think about her the deeper the shade of red her blush got.

Ten minutes passed by and finally, after she had her fill, Jacqueline grasped the woman's head on either side and viciously wrenched it to the right, snapping her neck and killing her almost instantly.

"Ahh...I feel so much better…" she sighed out of happiness now that some of the stress she had relieved itself from her body.

She hopped off the table and strolled over to an adjacent wall to take off a black velvet robe and slip it on, going over to the door and opening it so as to allow to torturers to come in and remove the corpse of the dead woman and dispose of it. When Jacqueline looked over at Kahfka after they had left, she quickly lowered her head and averted her eyes to try and hide her blush, but even so the Great General caught the movement out of the corner of her eyes and she giggled.

"Is something wrong? Kahfka?" she asked, Kahfka stiffening and rubbing her hands in her lap anxiously. "If there is, you can tell me."

Jacqueline walked back over to the table and sat down, her legs dangling off the side while she stared at Kahfka with a concerned expression. A few seconds of awkward silence trudged on before she finally brought her head up and tried hard to stare only at Jacqueline's eyes and not think about anything else.

"D-Do you like doing that t-to girls…?" she asked in a stutter, her entire body now shaking out of nervousness.

"I don't normally kill them, if that's what your wondering. I-"

"No! I mean, um…" she blurted out, Jacqueline jumping slightly at the loud interruption and raising an eyebrow in confusion.

Kahfka poked her index fingers together and bit her lip before asking again, "What I mean is...d-do you like g-girls?"

Her blush got even redder now that she had said it out loud and Jacqueline looked at her for a moment before she laughed and crossed her legs over, leaning back and putting her weight on the palms of her hands afterwards. She developed a slight blush herself and she twirled a small strand of her auburn hair while glancing at another part of the room.

"When you put it like that, I...I guess I do." she replied before she crossed over her arms. "I bet you think it's weird, don't you?"

"No, I don't think it's weird!" exclaimed Kahfka again, Jacqueline's gaze darting back to her when she shifted uncomfortably in her seat and looked around the room a few times. "Because, well, um...y-you're not the o-only one…"

Tense silence arose between the two when they made eye contact with one another and Kahfka continued to nervously rub her hands together in her lap, Jacqueline on the other hand staring at her with a slight look of surprise. She hadn't been expecting something like this to happen, and now she was interested to see where the conversation would be going next.

"What makes you say that…?"

Kahfka looked up from her lap and smiled a little as she said, "Even though it's only been a day...I-I think, um…"

She was struggling to get the right words out, but judging from how flustered she was, the blush on her face and her overall body posture...Jacqueline had a pretty good idea as to what she wanted to get off her chest. And truthfully she had been hiding some feelings as well, so if Kahfka was willing to show hers...she would too.

Without a word, Jacqueline pushed herself off the table and strode over to Kahfka, bent down and grabbed the bottom of her chin so as to lift her head up and kiss her lightly on the lips. Kahfka's eyes shot open when their lips touched, but instead of pulling away, she embraced her feelings and kissed back. In a matter of seconds their clothes had been discarded all over the floor of the room and they were both on the the operating table, completely naked and utterly enthralled with one another. Jacqueline was lying on her back with Kahfka over her and she let out a high-pitched moan when she felt Kahfka's lips wrap around her left breast's nipple and start sucking.

Waves of pleasure shot like lightning through every vein in her body as Kahfka continued to suck on her left breast, and involuntarily her response was to reach down with a free hand and grab Kahfka's ass cheek tightly. Kahfka gasped as a result, but it didn't stop her from switching over to the other breast and gentle kissing it while she sensually ran her hand down Jacqueline's stomach until coming to the sensitive area in between her legs.

She could feel Jacqueline shiver as a result of touching the inside of her though and she lifted her head up, deciding she was done with her breasts for now, and moved a few inches forward so that she could stare directly into her eyes.

Just from the look she gave her and the deep red blush spreading across her cheeks she could tell that this wasn't like before with that other woman. She wasn't some kind of playtoy that would satisfy her sexual desires...no, she felt the same way that Kahfka felt about her. The love they shared was genuine.

Jacqueline smiled before she kissed Kahfka passionately, who responded by inserting her index and middle finger past the folds of her wet sex.

"You're no longer...just my subordinate…" she murmured after they parted their lips and changed their position on the table from laying down to sitting across from one another with their legs spread open so that their hips were touching and they could begin the grind up against one another.

"I want you to be, ah, my lover...Kahfka…" she said, Kahfka smiling at both the proclamation of love and the feeling of her sex rubbing up against hers.

"Yes...I want to be yours...I'll follow you anywhere!" she exclaimed.

Jacqueline couldn't hold back her body any longer and she threw herself into Kahfka, assaulting her with another passionate kiss while she fondled one of Kahfka's ample breasts with her hand.

Outside the Inquisitor shifted his weight onto his other foot as he leaned against the wall and he cracked open an eye to look at the sealed metal door of the box next to him. He chuckled to himself as he closed the eye and sighed heavily while pulling the bill of his top hat down over his forehead.

" _Seems I'll be waiting here for a little while longer…_ "

 **\- The Badlands -**

 **\- 1:30 p.m -**

"They were definitely here recently. The cinders are still warm." stated Susanoo as he stood up and dusted himself after examining a pile of ash and charred wood in the center of the small cave. Najenda nodded and she turned away from her Teigu towards the opposite side of the ravine the cave was located in, Leone and Lubbock standing on the edge of the cliff to try and see if there were any possible markers that could give them a hint as to where the Jaegers had gone.

"Anything?" she yelled, Leone glancing back over her shoulder and shaking her head.

"Nothing, Boss!"

"Alright, then get back over here! We'll meet back on top!" she shouted back, Leone nudging Lubbock and leaping over the crevice to the other side while Najenda and Susanoo climbed out from the cave and back to the surface above it where the others were waiting. Gazia looked up from his guitar after tuning the instrument and crossed his arms when they walked over to them with less then pleased expressions on their faces.

"I'm assuming we got nothing?"

"Not one thing." replied Najenda as she pulled out a cigarette from her pocket and popped it into her mouth, her hand diving back for the lighter. "Did any of you find any traces of them around the ravine?"

"Not really. Coming out here was a good choice for them since its hard to track anyone in a place like this." said Mine with an irritated sigh as she flipped back one of her pony tails and placed a hand on her hip.

Najenda blew out a cloud of smoke after sucking on the cigarette and she delved into her thoughts in trying to figure out where their targets would be heading next. She knew that coming here to the Badlands was to ensure they wouldn't be followed, but there was one thing that kept nagging at her from the back of her mind. Just *why would they go rogue, especially Esdeath? Her old comrade was one of the most loyal Generals the Empire had, and the very thought of her going rogue was mind-blowing.

It all sounded like a trap to her, a trick to lure them all into one place so it would be easier for them to kill them. That sounded like the most obvious reason. But then there was the problem with Budo...Akame had confirmed the Great General's body herself. He was well and truly dead. Could it have been a power struggle? She knew that Esdeath was all about being strong and trampling over the weak, and it seemed logical for her to one day challenge the Great General for his position in an attempt to gain even more say and power within the Imperial Military.

" _Esdeath...just what are you up to?_ " she thought before she returned to reality and started to walk towards the giant falcon Danger Beast she had been supplied with.

"Come on, we'll head to the closest town and see if they went there. If not, we'll expand our search to cover a wider area. We will find the Jaegers, no matter what."


	17. Hunting the Hunters

A/N Alrighty then, now that I got that last chapter out of the way, sort of a filler chapter to be perfectly honest to build up to more action that will definitely be coming, I can focus on delving deeper into the plot I have planned. Believe me guys, it's gonna be great. Also, I have been EXTREMELY busy getting as much information up on the wiki, FanficCollective, as possible, and I have to admit...I'm proud of myself. I was able to create pages for a lot of Teigu, including but not limited to **Devil's Heart** , **Brahmastra** , **Tyrannus** , **Grand Chariot** , and so on. They will be subject to changes of course as the story progresses. So for now,m enjoy what I have on there now, and take a glimpse at what Tatsumi's Teigu looks like now as a result of fusing with Tyrant and evolving Incursio into its new form, Demon Dragon's Flesh: Tyrannus. Took me a few hours to draw it, but it looks GREAT. Just a reminder for those just now joining, search up **FanficCollective** on google and it's the first link that pops up. Then you head over to the page titled **A Different Path** , and from there, you guys will have access to everything that is going on in this story, as well as a preview to characters who have yet to be revealed on the main page for it in the character list. Happy searching! Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 16 - Hunting the Hunters**

 **\- Marg Plateau -**

 **\- One Day Later -**

"Ah, today feels like such a good day...the sun is shining...the birds are chirping…" stated Jacqueline with a sigh of joy before she brought her hand up and licked the blood off all five fingers as she sat at the very top of a mound of corpses.

They were bandits who had thought her and Kahfka would be easy pickings while they were out on a pair of horses. When they attacked, they had no idea just what kind of monster they were provoking, and consequently they all lost their lives. She looked down from her throne of bodies and smiled at Kahfka, her newest subordinate and lover finishing off the last bandit left alive by impaling him through the chest with her weapon.

It was unique in both its appearance and in the power it contained, since it was a Shingu given to her upon her admittance into the Elite Seven. It's name, if she could recall, was Cypher and it enabled her to teleport anywhere within a ten foot radius.

"Don't you think so, Kahfka?" she asked, the young woman pulling her blade out of the dead bandit and turning around so she could return the smile.

"Yes, it is quite lovely out here." she replied, the sunlight glinting off her blade as she whipped it to the side to get rid of the blood on it. "How do you think the Inquisitor is doing right now?"

Jacqueline leaped off the corpse mound and dusted herself off before looking into the bright blue sky and putting a hand to her chest, feeling the irregular beats of her two hearts and smiling when she felt his presence.

"He's fine...I know it."

"How?" asked Kahfka as they mounted their steeds and continued on their way through the rocky landscape.

"Oh, that's right. I haven't told you about my Teigu yet." said Jacqueline before she held up her right hand and opened it, a sharpened bone protrusion tearing its way the skin a second later. "It's name is Devil's Heart, and it lets me to manipulate the growth of my skeletal system to allow me to create blades from it alongside other abilities, like regenerating injuries and lost limbs."

"Where is it?"

Jacqueline maneuvered her horse close to Kahfka's and she grabbed her hand after absorbing the bone, placing her fingers on her skin just above her cleavage and staying perfectly silent. Kahfka didn't understand what she was doing at first until she gasped when she felt her heart give off a characteristic "ba-bump" _alongside_ another heartbeat immediately after the first.

"It's a heart that I had surgically implanted into me. And why it relates to how I can tell if the Inquisitor is okay or not is because when he first became my subordinate and protector, he allowed me and a colleague of mine to replace his entire bone structure with another made entirely from my bones, which are incredibly strong due to Devil's Heart, alongside with having most of his internal organs replaced with machines that increased his power. I can feel them inside of him and through that I can determine if he's alive or not." she explained with a soft smile as she removed Kahfka's hand from her chest and touched the spot with her own, Kahfka marvelling at the Inquisitor and everything he's sacrificed for her.

That's when another question popped into her head, one that she's been dying to know ever since she first met the strange and intriguing man.

"You know...how _did_ he become your protector? He's definitely older then you." she asked, Jacqueline looking over at her and laughing.

"Yes, he is...he's thirty two, and I myself am only twenty one. But how we met...I'll never forget it."

 **\- Imperial Capital Orphanage -**

 **\- Sixteen Years ago -**

"Please, stop!"

A young girl with auburn hair was pushed hard into a wall and she collapsed to the ground, tears streaming down her cheeks from the pain she felt after the impact. She looked up at the two older boys bullying her and before she could say anything, one of them reached over and grabbed her by the hair, lifting her up and laughing when she cried out again.

"Why don't you just shut up and stay on the ground, like the trash you are!" he exclaimed before tossing her back to the ground again, the young girl cuddling up into a ball to try and hide her tears from them.

This wasn't the first time she had been bullied upon coming to the orphanage. She was ridiculed by the other kids there, even the females, for how strange her eyes looked. She was born with a yellow right eye and a purple left eye, immediately marking her as "weird" among the kids and a target. She could never make friends because everyone wanted to stay away from her, so every day when they were given breakfast, lunch and dinner, she sat in the farthest corner away from everyone else, alone and without anyone to talk to.

Still, she held on to the hope that some day she'll be able to leave the orphanage and be adopted by a family who didn't care about her appearance. Although, this hope was beginning the fade day by day since every family she was introduced to immediately found her to be undesirable, "defective", she would hear them whisper as soon as she left.

"Now apologize for opening those eyes of yours around us! Freak!" shouted the other boy as he kicked her in the side, the young girl crying out again and whimpering as she hugged herself tighter, hoping that they would lose interest.

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry…!" she sobbed before she was kicked again, the boy's evil smile growing the more pain he inflicted unto her.

"Hey! What the heck do you think you're doing!" shouted a voice from down the hall, the two boys whipping their heads around to see another boy older then them by a couple of years sprinting their way.

"Let's get out of here!" said one of the boys as they turned tail and ran, the third boy coming to a screeching halt beside the little girl and panting a few times as he caught his breath.

He looked down on her and lowered himself to a knee, reaching out and gently touching her shoulder to see if she was okay and to comfort her. "Hey, it's fine now. Those boys are gone."

"R-Really?"

"Yeah, I chased them off."

The young girl shuddered again, but slowly she lifted her head up and out of her arms to look around before pushing herself up to a sitting position. She looked up at her savior and she veered away from him when she reached for her face, but when she felt him wipe the tears away from the corner of her eyes, she relaxed somewhat now that she knew he wouldn't hurt her.

"Are you okay?" he asked, the young girl sniffling and lowering her eyes from his.

"Why did you save me?" she asked out of the blue, the boy caught off guard by the sudden question.

"They were hurting you, so I stopped them. Simple as that." he replied.

"But don't you hate me?"

"Hate you? Why would I hate you?" he asked, the girl looking back at him again and showing him her strangely colored eyes again.

"Everybody here hates and makes fun of me because of my eyes...they say they look weird, and they bully me over and over and over, calling me names, hurting me..." she replied, a fresh batch of tears beginning to roll down her cheeks again as she started to cry.

She buried her face in her hands and the boy watched and waited patiently, silently detesting the boys he had scared off for hurting her alongside the rest of the kids in the orphanage just because of her different colored eyes.

"I don't think they look weird."

The girl froze in her crying and slowly brought her head up to stare at the boy again, his expression turning into a warm smile as he sat down next to her and wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

"Y-You don't…?"

"Not at all." he replied. "In fact, I think it looks cool. I wish my eyes looked like that, only the colors should be like, green and red. Oh, maybe even orange and blue!"

The tears flowing down the girl's face finally subsided and she started to lighten up the more she was around this mysterious boy who had decided the save her. She touched him on the shoulder and he stopped ranting about having eyes like hers, anxiously waiting for what she wanted to say.

"W-Who are you?"

"Oh, right, sorry. To be honest, I...don't really have a name. I was abandoned by my parents and I decided to let go of the name they gave me, too many bad memories you see. That was when I was seven years old, and I've been here ever since." he replied with a heavy sigh.

"How old are you now?" asked the girl, the boy perking up again after he stopped thinking about his childhood.

"I'm sixteen. What about you?" he asked, the girl shrinking down again and poking her fingers together shyly.

"Um...I'm five. A-And my name is Jacqueline…" she replied.

"Well then, Jacqueline." the boy started as he pushed himself up off the ground and offered a hand to the girl, who looked up at him with a confused look on her face. "I'll be your protector from now on. I'll never let anyone hurt you ever again."

The girl's eyes widened and a smile spread across her face as tears of happiness replaced the ones of sorrow she had been shedding earlier. "R-Really? You promise?"

"Really. I promise. Now come on, let's take you to the nurse, and when you're all patched up, I'll eat lunch with you."

 **\- Present Day -**

"And that's how he became my protector. He stayed by my side and ate with me, talked with me, and comforted me if I was sad. Even when he got too old to stay there, he signed up and became a staff member of the orphanage to continue looking over me until the day I got old to enough to leave and enter the Imperial military training academy." said Jacqueline with a smile as she finished her story, Kahfka staring at her in total awe.

"And he followed you still?" she asked, the Great General nodding before she wiped a single tear from the corner of her eye.

"Yes, he's stayed by my side ever since that day. When he became the assassin known as the God of Death, he used the money he got from his assignments to help care for me alongside himself. He's always been there for me, and for that he is my most precious subordinate and friend."

"Wow…that's amazing." uttered Kahfka as they rounded a bend in the craggy road leading up to a large mountainous hill in the plateau region.

When she recognized it from the reports she had requested before wheedling out she stopped her horse and leaped off, Kahfka following suite. They tied the reins to a small rock and they approached a cave-like entrance leading into the mound's interior, Kahfka grasping her blade just in case.

"We should be fine Kahfka. Besides, if this man we're meeting proves to be a problem, we'll easily kill him." said Jacqueline with a cheery smile, Kahfka glancing at her before she too smiled and lowered the strange looking blade.

They arrived at the entrance of the cave and they glanced at one another before they stepped into the darkness. They both heard the sound of running water and they walked towards it, turning around a corner and seeing a light at the end of the tunnel. Finally, after walking for what seemed like an eternity, they emerged into an underground cavern lit by torches that served as the source of light and heat. They looked around and marveled at what was hanging from the walls and ceiling of the cavern, like they were two children who just entered a whole other world.

In a sense, it was. The cavern walls were lined with the heads and skins of all sorts of Danger Beasts from all walks of life, both known and unknown. From the ceiling hung the skeleton of a massive aquatic-type animal, most likely from the ocean, and just from the size of the teeth it possessed they could assume that it was a Super-class.

"So just who exactly is this guy?" asked Kahfka after she pried her eyes away from the skeleton.

"You could say I'm a… _collector_ of sorts."

The two women whirled around and watched as a man wearing an extravagant looking robe emerged from a separate cave to their right, his left hand tucked into a pocket and his right swaying at his side. His appearance differed drastically from the cavern, but what out them off the most was that his face was completely hidden by a pitch black mask possessing no visible orifices whatsoever.

"How can I be of assistance to you two fine women?" asked the man as he walked over to them and ran as hand through his dark maroon hair.

"I'm assuming you're the legendary Danger Beast hunter?" asked Jacqueline, the man chuckling before he bowed courteously.

"Indeed I am, madam. My name is Copra, and it's a pleasure to meet both of you. May I have your names?"

"This is my subordinate Kahfka, and I'm Great General Jacqueline." she replied, the man nodding once as he returned to his full height and placed his other hand in his pocket.

"What brings you to my humble abode, Great General?" he asked, Jacqueline placing a hand on her hip and motioning to the trophies all around them.

"I've heard that you've managed to hunt down, capture and kill every single species of Danger Beast in the world, including Super-class, even if there is nothing left to track, correct?"

"Yes, miss. I pride myself on that achievement, but… I've gotten quite bored here recently. I enjoy the thrill of the hunt, but what is a hunter without something to hunt?" asked Copra before he began to stroll casually around in a circle, looking at every single one of the Danger Beasts he had hanging on his wall. "Like you said, I have hunted down every single species and type currently in the world today, and now that there's nothing left...I've become lost as to what to do."

"Actually, there is." stated Jacqueline with a grin, Copra looking back at her and cocking his head to the right.

"Indulge me."

"I came here to enlist you in hunting down a group of traitors to the Empire for me, since I have to deal with a revolution currently taking place." she explained, Copra slowly nodding his head before he sat down in an expensive looking chair and crossed his legs over.

"Who exactly are these traitors?" he asked, Kahfka being the one to speak up this time.

"The Jaegers, a squad made up entirely of Teigu users."

" Really? All of them?" questioned the hunter before he leaned forward and stared straight at Jacqueline. " _Now_ this sounds interesting. Go on."

"The group's led by the former General Esdeath, one of the strongest soldiers the Empire has ever produced, and the other members are also highly skilled as well. Think of this as the ultimate test of your skills." said Jacqueline, Copra leaning back in the chair and rubbing his chin in deep thought.

He had heard of the reputation of the "Empire's Strongest General", and to be honest the thought of being proclaimed as the one who hunt her down alongside the other Jaegers was tantalizing.

"A hunt for the most dangerous game…" he murmured before he sprung up from his chair and crossed his arms, chuckling to himself. "Very well. I accept this challenge as the hunt of a lifetime!"

Jacqueline smiled evilly as she shook the hunter's hand to solidify their deal and began to walk back towards the exit with Kahfka at her side. "How soon will you depart?" she asked, Coors looking back at her on his way to a separate chamber.

"I will head out immediately, Miss Jacqueline. If I may ask, would you lend me one of your horses to help in my hunt?" he asked, Jacqueline nodding.

"Also, take this." she said before tossing over a bag, Copra catching it and finding a broken piece of navy blue armor sealed inside. "This'll help you get started."

"I appreciate it. I bid you two farewell." he said with a bow, the Great General pushing aside a strand of her hair before leaving with Kahfka in tow.

Once they emerged back out into the sunlight, Jacqueline's face contorted once again into a devious and evil smile as they walked over to their horses. Kahfka noticed the change in attitude in her and she asked, "Everything okay?"

"Yes, of course. I'm happy because now that I have that hunter taking on the task of tracking down the Jaegers, I can refocus on annihilating the enemy that threatens the capital. Care to help?" she asked after pulling herself up onto her horse and offering a hand down to her.

Kahfka took it and she was hoisted up onto the horse, taking a seat right behind Jacqueline and wrapping her arms around her waist while she rested her chin on her shoulder. Jacqueline couldn't help but blush as they began their trek back towards the Empire from the home of the hunter.

Inside, Copra had changed his outfit to that of battle armor with a hood that covered up his hair. He was in one of the separate chambers connected to his trophy room standing before a pedestal holding a unique sword looking highly reminiscent of a human spinal cord with serrated edges. He grasped the handle and brought his arm around, the sword immediately coming alive and flexing before curling up like how a whip would be carried so Copra could attach it to a ring on his belt.

"Now then…"

Copra turned towards a darkened portion of the cavern and he crossed his arms when the glowing red eyes of creatures hidden by the blackness stared back at him, all sorts of growls and snarls echoing from within. He grabbed a nearby torch and held it up, the flickering flames illuminating the faces of at least forty dogs with their snouts and jaws completely replaced by metal appendages bristling with razor sharp teeth capable of ripping flesh apart.

One by one he released the dogs from their cages and led them outside of the cave, the group of dogs all gathering around him and wagging their tails anxiously in anticipation for their master to give them a command. Copra hopped onto the horse left behind by Jacqueline and he looked to the horizon, a small breeze picking up as he opened the bag and tossed the piece of armor down into the middle of the dogs.

Once they all got a good whiff of the armor fragment they stood at attention, their ears bent straight backward while their noses immediately picked up the scent provided by the shard.

"Let us be off, my noble hounds! The hunt is on!" he proclaimed at the top of his lungs, the dogs howling in response before they took off at breakneck speed, Copra following right behind them.

Another week passed by in the blink of an eye since the Danger Beast Hunter Copra began his pursuit of the Jaegers, and the chokehold the Revolutionary Army, the Path of Peace and the Western Nations' army held around the Imperial Capital tightened. However, all three factions had no idea that even though Great General Budo had been killed and the Jaegers had fled from the capital, the Empire had yet another weapon far worse then they could've ever imagined, and they would meet it in the worst possible way.

When Esdeath's former army met the Western Nations' army, they were greeted by the Inquisitor himself, who had come there under orders from Jacqueline to, how she put it, "Wipe out any chances of them from even thinking of attacking the Empire again". As the sun rose up over the field in which the two opposing armies would do battle, the Inquisitor led the charge of the well trained army formerly led by Esdeath and absolutely _annihilated_ the vanguard of the Western Nations' army. But even after their destruction the carnage continued on until only a shred of the once proud and mighty army that had conquered every challenge the Empire threw at them was left to run away, tails between their legs.

That was one threat down.

Next to follow was the Path of Peace. To combat them, Honest had managed to get in contact with another one of the Empire's most feared soldiers, aside from Budo and Esdeath, a Lieutenant Colonel who was in command of a special division within the Imperial military, and bring his troops back down to surprise the religious organization's army and wipe out most of their army in a matter of minutes.

Two threats taken care of...one more to go.

The final problem the Empire was facing was the Revolutionary Army itself and the Shisuikan, which had become their forward operating base to attack the Imperial capital once their allies had arrived. Not a single Imperial soldier came to take it. Only two people arrived...the last survivor of the Elite Seven massacre and the new Great General herself. Even when faced with the might of an entire army and the defensive power of the great Shisuikan itself, they splattered the fortress walls with the blood of their enemies and took it back for the Empire single handedly in under an hour.

In just a _day_ , the Great General had eliminated the threat posed by the three armies on the Imperial capital and set back their plans for toppling the Empire almost indefinitely...which meant now there was nothing stopping them from retaliation. Under orders from Jacqueline, the Inquisitor pushed on with the army under his command and once she and Kahfka arrived from the Shisuikan after the Lieutenant Colonel and his division quartered up in the fortress, they invaded the Western Nations and conquered the three independant states that made up the coalition in only five days.

To make them pay for even thinking of fighting the Empire in the first place, Jacqueline slaughtered the ruling officials of their government and forced the survivors, both political and military, to go into hiding deep within the mountains sitting behind the capital city.

While still licking their wounds, the remaining forces of the Revolutionary Army and the Path of Peace retreated back to the former's secret base located in the Southern Territories for, upon returning to Kyoroch, the Lord and his disciples had discovered that Jacqueline had also ordered for the razing of the city by the Incineration Squad. Kyoroch was left in ruins and they had no choice but to join with the Revolutionary Army just to _survive_.

And all the while, Prime Minister Honest was gleefully laughing from the Emperor's side upon hearing every single one of the accomplishments the new Great General had brought about.

"Splendid work! Splendid!" he bellowed with a guttural laugh after Jacqueline herself informed him of the total subjugation of the Western Nations by the Inquisitor and Esdeath's army, no, _her_ army.

"It was my pleasure, Prime Minister." she replied with a smile as she took a seat opposite of him at a banquet table within the Imperial Palace.

"Tell me, how were you able to enable such a quick takeover of an entire nation? You conquered the Western Nations faster then when Esdeath took over the Northern territories." asked Honest as he ingested a large steak, Jacqueline crossing her legs over and laughing.

"Fear, Prime Minister. The key is _fear_. Fear is such a useful emotion, since it can turn the mightiest of warriors into spineless cowards."

"Ah, yes. Indeed it is." said Honest with a malicious smile. "How goes it with the hunt for the Jaegers?"

"I've got someone already on it. He's named Copra, and he's famous for hunting down every single species and class of Danger Beast on the planet, both known and unknown. He'll be able to track the Jaegers easily, no matter how well they cover their tracks." stated Jacqueline as she raised a wine glass to her lips and ingested the red liquid inside.

"Oh? Really?" questioned Honest with a baffled look.

"Trust me, Prime Minister, I have everything under control. Soon, the Jaegers will be delivered back to the capital and as punishment, I'll torture them to the point there will be nothing left of them." said Jacqueline evilly with a giggle, Honest raising an eyebrow and chuckling.

"Excellent. I look forward to it, Great General."


	18. Learning the Truth

A/N Welp, shit. Jacqueline's a total badass. The Inquisitor's a total badass. And Kahfka, well, you'll just have to wait and see. Nothing else to say about that. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 17 - Learning the Truth**

"What...happened here?"

"I-I don't know…" replied back Wave to Chelsea's question as he and the rest of the Jaegers stared out speechless at the flaming ruins of Kyoroch, the headquarters of the Path of Pace.

They had travelled here under the hope that the Lord would offer them sanctuary for the time being, like he had promised, but after coming to the city and seeing that it was now a desolate wasteland dominated by scorched wood and fire...that hope was instantly crushed.

"Actually, I have a pretty good idea." stated Esdeath after observing the damage caused to the city and crossing her arms.

Tatsumi, after spending a few moments thinking about who or what would be able to cause damage on this scale, put the puzzle pieces together and figured out the culprit as well. "Let me guess...the Incineration Squad."

Esdeath nodded solemnly as she bent down and pushed aside a small mound of ash at her feet, revealing a burnt photo of some family she either knew or seen before. She stared at it for a few seconds, wondering if they had either managed to escape Kyoroch's destruction or had gotten caught in the inferno, before she heard the cawing of a bird in the distance.

She stood back up and turned around, smirking as she held her arm out to allow a falcon-like Danger Beast to land on her arm and flap its wings a few times before folding them up.

"What's that?" asked Kurome while Esdeath pulled out a rolled up piece of paper from inside the carrier pack the animal wore on its back.

"In the last town we were at I was able to get a message to an old friend of mine in the Intelligence Department who owed me a favor. What I have here is information listing everything that's gone on within and outside the Empire since our departure from the capital."

She unrolled the paper and Tatsumi walked over so he could get a look of it himself as she read it, his expression hat of intense curiosity. Slowly, however, as he made his way down the document both he and Esdeath developed an alarming look.

"Holy shit…" muttered Tatsumi after he reached the end of the list, the other Jaegers looking from him to Esdeath and the paper in utter silence and suspense.

"So, uh, you planning on sharing with us?" asked Solomon, Chelsea nodding eagerly in agreement with him.

"Well, we were right about the Incineration Squad being the ones to destroy Kyoroch, but...it just gets worse…" replied Tatsumi as he turned away from them and placed his hands on his hips, Esdeath handing over the paper to Run so he and the others could look at it.

Soon they too came to realize just what had happened in the time they had been gone and on the run, and the very thought of it simply baffled them.

"Did...did this really all happen in such a short amount of time?" asked Wave in total disbelief, both Tatsumi and Esdeath nodding their heads.

"Yes, it's an off-" started Esdeath before she suddenly froze up and he hand flew to the hilt of her rapier, Tatsumi immediately looking skyward and frowning when he recognized what was coming straight for them.

"You feel it too?" she asked.

"Yeah, it's them." he replied, the other Jaegers finally sensing what the two had felt moments before and tensing, each member reaching and or activating their own Teigu.

Esdeath's eyes narrowed when from the dark clouds and smoke above, the latter originating from Kyoroch, a falcon Danger Beast many times larger than the one that had delivered to them the information from the capital appeared with none other then the entire Night Raid organization on its back. She could see Najenda glaring at her, radiating such hate and animosity that she could feel it from there.

"How did they find us?" asked Wave before he glanced back over his shoulder at the huge columns of smoke rising up into the sky and grimaced. "Of course...the huge ass smoke columns are a dead giveaway."

"What are they doing here? Are they going to attack us?" asked Esdeath under her breath, Tatsumi watching as the giant bird made its descent towards the ground and slowly shaking his head.

"If they were then Mine would've already started shooting at us with Pumpkin." he whispered back when Najenda landed the large bird and hopped off from its neck, Susanoo right beside her.

Akame came off next, followed by Leone, Lubbock, Mine and Gazia. They stared at their enemy with blank expressions as they followed Najenda until coming to a stop a few yards away from Tatsumi and Esdeath.

"Esdeath." said Najenda coldly to her old comrade, Esdeath lowering her gaze somewhat.

Mine crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow when she noticed someone trying to hide themselves behind Wave, so she cocked her head to the right a bit to get a better look and gasped when she recognized who it was.

"Chelsea?! Is that you?" she asked, the other members staring right at Wave and watching as their old friend gingerly stepped out from behind Wave and nervously laughed.

"Uh, hi, guys. Long time no see…"

"You joined the Jaegers? How could you?" asked Leone, Chelsea touching the ground with her toe and lowering her gaze out of discomfort before Solomon raised an arm up as if to hide her from their judging gaze.

"It's because she feels indebted to me." stated Tatsumi, Najenda glaring at him. "I saved her life."

" _You_ saved _her_ life? What could you possibly mean by that?" snorted Gazia as he crossed his arms out of doubt, Tatsumi growling silently under his breath at his attitude.

He quickly calmed down though, since he didn't want to provoke them into a fight, and he put his hands into his pockets. "You remember the person that killed Sheele, right? Mine?"

The pink-haired assassin was surprised when he addressed her directly, but she quickly hid it and frowned a little when he brought up the death of her friend.

"Yeah, why?"

"She's dead. I killed her."

That was when the entirety of Night Raid lost their blank and hateful looks and stared at him in total shock, the startling news hitting them like a boulder. She was dead? And _he_ was the one to kill her? How? Why? All of these questions began to swirl inside their heads as a result of his statement, and now that he had said it they were craving more information.

"You killed her?" asked Najenda, Tatsumi pointing back at Chelsea with a thumb.

"She almost killed Chelsea with that dog of hers before I stepped in and took her on. And that's why she feels indebted to me too, because if it hadn't been for me, she would've been devoured just like Sheele. I couldn't let a fate like that happen to another friend of mine...I just couldn't." he continued, Lubbock glancing at Chelsea and blinking a few times.

"Is that true? Chelsea?" he asked, the former Night Raid Member lifting up her head and slowly nodding.

"Okay, sure, you killed that psychopath, big whoop. What I want to know is why you burned Kyoroch to the ground." questioned Gazia darkly, both Esdeath and Tatsumi fixing their gazes on him and frowning at the accusation.

"It wasn't us, for your information." said Run sternly as he stepped forward, deactivating Mastema at the same time. "We just arrived her a few minutes ago."

"Oh really? I find that hard to believe." retorted Leone with a growl.

That was when Tatsumi, who was fed up with the entire situation, motioned to Esdeath to hand him the paper she was holding. She gave it to him and he held it up for them all to see, Najenda instantly spotting the seal of the Empire on it and another symbol she recognized as the Intelligence Department's logo.

"From what I can tell, you guys have been focused solely on tracking us down, right?" he asked, Najenda glaring at him in silence before she nodded. "Well, while you were doing that...a lot has been going on within the Empire."

"What do you mean?" asked Akame, Tatsumi looking at her and sighing out of regret before he lowered the paper and started at the top of the document.

"This paper details all of the events that have transpired in and around the Empire ever since we left the capital, which is something I'm sure you all know about by now." he started off before his eyes went back to the paper from Akame and went over the first bullet point.

"First off, Great General Budo is killed when he attempted to stop the Special Police Force "Jaegers" from leaving the capital. All members, including General Esdeath, are now considered to be traitors to the Empire and must be apprehended under the charges of interfering with the public execution of Jaeger member Tatsumi, who was condemned to death for attempting to assassinate the Prime Minister." he read aloud clearly so that everyone present could hear.

Just from their expressions alone he could tell that he had struck a chord inside them that made their world flip three hundred and sixty degrees. The Jaegers weren't out here to lure them into a trap, they were on the run from the capital because they saved Tatsumi from being executed. It made no sense, and they wanted to ask why, but he wasn't done, this was only the tip of the iceberg.

"Next, to compensate for the loss of Great General Budo, Prime Minister Honest promotes a new Great General. The first act of the new commanding officer is to shut down the assassination teams Elite Seven and Group of Terror. Upon arriving at the building they used as their headquarters, all members of both teams were found dead, with the team leaders, Gozuki of the Elite Seven and Barraka of the Group of Terror, decapitated."

Both Akame and Kurome gasped at the mentioning of the two teams they hailed from while they were still a part of the Empire. The thought of their former comrades and, more importantly, the only friends they had in that dark point in their lives, all dead… it shook them down to the very core.

"To deal with the threat the Revolutionary Army, the Path of Peace, and the Western Nations' army posed to the capital and the Empire as a whole, the Great General's subordinate, the infamous assassin nicknamed the "God of Death" leads the army formerly belonging to the traitor, General Esdeath, against the Western Nations' army and annihilates them. The Path of Peace is met by the special Imperial Army division "Hellraisers", led by Lieutenant Colonel Costner, and immediately repelled, reducing their numbers to the point they can no longer be considered a threat. Finally, the Revolutionary Army, who have been in control of the Shisuikan, were attacked directly by the Great General and another subordinate and defeated in under an hour. Reports show that the walls of the fortress were stained red as a result of the attack."

By this point in the document, Najenda and the rest of Night Raid were feeling at the influx of news that only seemed to get worse and worse as Tatsumi went on down the list. All of their allies had been suddenly defeated by this new Great General, along with their hopes of bringing down the Empire. However, when Tatsumi cleared his throat, they braced themselves for whatever came next.

"The last entry shows that in retaliation for the revolution, the Great General and the Empire's forces invaded the Western Nations and conquered them in only five days, the leading political figures of said nations being executed soon afterwards. The Hellraisers secured Shisuikan, and to prevent the Path of Peace survivors from reaching their headquarters, and to send a message, the Incineration Squad was sent to the Imperial City of Kyoroch under orders to burn the entire city to the ground and leave nothing behind. The current whereabouts of the surviving forces of the Revolutionary Army and the Path of Peace are unknown, but it is believed that their headquarters rest somewhere within the Southern Territories." finished Tatsumi before tossing the paper aside and staring at Najenda, the woman simply staring at him in utter horror.

"I-Is that all true?" stammered Lubbock, Esdeath stepping forward so she was standing right next to Tatsumi and nodding slowly.

"Yes...every single word." she replied, the Jaegers standing behind them finally relaxing after Night Raid lost the edge in their posture.

"M-My home...it was...invaded?" asked Mine as tears began to emerge in her eyes, Susano'o immediately responding by wrapping an arm around her and hugging her.

Akame couldn't stop staring at Tatsumi, and when he finally noticed her gaze she asked, "So...you're all rogue?" she asked in almost a whisper. "And Tatsumi, you tried to kill Honest? On your own?"

"No, not alone."

Her eyes moved from Tatsumi to Chelsea as she put a hand on her hip and grinned, the stick of her lollipop sticking out between her teeth. "We all agreed to kill Honest. It was Tatsumi who said though that he would take the fall for us to protect us."

"And of course we couldn't let that happen." added Wave before he threw an arm around Tatsumi's shoulder and smiled.

Akame was simply blown away by the sudden turn of event s the encounter had brought to them , their suspicions about the Jaegers that the all doubt instantly getting blown away. Deep down though a part of her still couldn't bring itself around to trust their word, but when she saw her sister come forward with a smile on her face and her hands behind her back, nowhere near Yatsufusa, that doubt suddenly disappeared. From her body posture alone she knew that she didn't want to fight, because there was no need to any more.

"It's all real, Big Sis. I…" she said at first before she blinked, a single tear rolling down her cheek. "I...I'm sorry it took so long to leave."

After a moment of silence between the two opposing groups, regardless of their past differences and uncaring of what anyone thought, the two sisters walked toward one another and embraced for the first time in several years, Akame herself shedding tears of joy and relief knowing that she can finally relinquish the desire to kill her little sister. Kurome responded back by hugging Akame tightly and burrowing her face into her older sister's shoulder to hide her own tears.

They were together when they had been tossed into the hellish training to be considered for enlistment into the assassination groups, then separated when Akame was drafted into the Elite Seven and Kurome to the Group of Terror. When Akame defected to Night Raid, they were separated not only by squad but by affiliation as well, and both sisters vowed to kill the other. But now, with them both considered fugitives, traitors, whatever anyone wanted to call them...they no longer had to hold onto to that desire any longer.

They could finally be sisters again, not enemies, and the very thought of that alone was what had caused them to break down into tears.

"Najenda."

She looked up from the two sisters and stared at Esdeath, immediately becoming surprised when she saw the fearless and proud General she knew and once fought alongside, completely opposite of her personality, develop a regretfully expression and lower her gaze as if she didn't deserve .

"I...I'm sorry, for everything. And...I know just saying those words can't make up for my actions, but, I hope what I do now will show you that I'm no longer who I once was." said Esdeath before looking back Solomon and nodding, the Jaeger stepping forward and removing one of his gloves.

"What are you going to do?" asked Lubbock as he warily watched Solomon approach Najenda, his feelings towards the Jaegers still conflicted.

"Just watch the magic happen." said Wave with a wink, Lubbock raising an eyebrow in confusion at what he meant.

Solomon finally reached Najenda and he lowered his face mask, smiling at her before he pointed at her prosthetic arm. "I'm going to need you to remove that and your eyepatch."

"Why?" she asked, Solomon producing a needle from his pocket and cutting a thin line through the center of his palm. It was just deep enough to allow some of his blood to trickle out onto his skin, a perfect amount for what he wanted to do..

"Trust me. If I intended to kill you, I would've done it already." he said back with a chuckle before he held out his other hand.

Najenda looked down at it and sighed heavily as she reached up and slipped off the eye patch covering her right eye socket, handing it to Solomon so she could disconnect the metal arm from her shoulder and rest it on the ground. Solomon looked at the scar that had healed over her eye socket after it had been shot through by an icicle from Esdeath years before and then at the stump that had resulted from her right arm getting cut off.

"Piece of cake." murmured Solomon under his breath as he clenched the hand with the cut in it, the pressure causing more of his blood to seep out as begin to drip onto the ground.

Lubbock, Leone, Mine, Gazia and Akame watched in silence alongside the Jaegers when Solomon directed Najenda to drink the blood in his hand, which at first seemed disgusting to her, but after he urged her to do so she eventually gave in. She cringed slightly as she felt the red liquid slither down her throat, a feeling that she never wanted to experience ever again, and waited for something to happen.

All of a sudden she felt a rush of life energy course through her veins and she gasped, Solomon stepping back to watch the show with the rest of his friends. Steam began to emerge from what used to be her right arm and to everyone's awe, and slight disgust, the skin parted, allowing the bone to protrude out and begin to repair itself. Slowly it grew larger and larger until it finally recreated the last finger in the hand of the arm, the muscles and tissue now beginning to grow and form on the newly created bone. Once that finished up the skin stretched out over the limb and completed its regeneration, Najenda looking down at her arm with mouth agape. She got even more surprised when she felt the same feeling she got when her arm finished forming in her head, more specifically the spot where her right eye used to be, and so to see if what she thought was true she reached up with her left hand and touched what she knew was scar tissue.

Instead she felt the soft malleable skin of an eyelid, and just beyond that she could feel an eyeball...something she hadn't had in that spot for years now.

"Go ahead, try to move them." said Solomon after healing his hand, Najenda lowering her hand and attempting to open her right eye.

It was foreign to her at first, but finally after trying for a few seconds, her right eyelid slowly opened and she looked through her right eye at Esdeath, the dark spot she formerly had on that side of her vision completely gone now.

She could see with both eyes, an experience that was so overwhelming for her she almost forgot that she had regained her right arm too, so after holding back the tears she looked down at her right hand and tested the muscles to see if they worked. When she moved every single finger once and closed them all into a fist, she couldn't help but laugh.

"I...I can't believe it…" she murmured before looking back up at Esdeath and the small smile she had gotten upon seeing her old comrade back in proper condition. "Esdeath, you…"

"You don't have to thank me, I don't deserve your thanks." she said, Najenda shaking her head as she walked up to the former General and, to everyone's surprise, hugged her.

"I don't care what you say. Thank you." she said with meaning, Esdeath looking at her with wide eyes before she accepted the hug and returned it.

"I never thought I would see something quite like this." said Leone with a grin as she placed a hand on her hip and watched as two sworn enemies make up in a matter of minutes, something that she still couldn't quite wrap her head around.

"You're telling me, and I've been around for over two hundred years." said Gazia with a glance at her, the two sharing a small laugh before they walked over with Mine and Lubbock to stand next to Najenda after she separated herself from Esdeath.

"Well, since you lot are traitors and seem to not have a place to stay, why don't you come with us back to our hideout?" she asked, Tatsumi raising an eyebrow in surprise.

"Really? You mean it?"

"Tatsumi, you know that answer better then anyone." stated Mine with a straight face.

"Shut up! It's been a while!" he exclaimed back, the two groups beginning to make their way towards Najenda's Danger Beast sitting a few meters away from them.

"I'll never be able to repay you for this, Najenda." said Esdeath to her old friend, Najenda glancing at her and grinning.

"You're damn right." she replied, the two former General's breaking out into a small bout of laughter.

 **\- Night Raid Headquarters -**

 **\- Two Hours -**

"So let me get this straight…" murmured Mine with a disgruntled look on her face, her stare resting solely on Tatsumi and Esdeath alone. "You two are _married_?!"

They looked at one another and then down at the gold rings they each wore on their ring finger before returning their attention to Mine and nodding.

"Yeah, that's pretty much it." said Tatsumi with a smile while Esdeath slipped her hand into his.

"That's not the only thing…" she said while blushing, Mine, Leone and Lubbock staring at her with blank expressions.

"What do you mean?"

Esdeath glanced down at her stomach and Tatsumi chuckled as he gave them a cheesy grin, Mine and Leone taking a few seconds to realize what she meant before their eyes shot wide open and their jaws dropped to the ground. Lubbock on the other hand merely nod his head in approval and gave him a thumbs up.

Over in the back of the living room Najenda was standing next to Wave, the two of them sharing some small talk. Akame and Kurome had gone off to another part of the base on their own, and Solomon, Chelsea and Run were currently outside ensuring the integrity of their location to make sure no one had followed them. Gazia had to leave as soon as they had arrived to see just how much damage the Revolutionary Army had taken as a result of the Empire's new Great General, so they were the only ones at the base.

"It's amazing to think that we would all be here like this, being enemies and such." said Najenda with a sigh, Wave crossing his arms and nodding in agreement.

"Yeah, I know what you mean. It was difficult, to say the least, when I was deciding if I should betray my ideals and loyalty to the Empire to help in killing the Prime Minister." he replied, Najenda taking her eyes off the commotion in the center of the room and looking at him.

"About that, who exactly was the mastermind behind that plan?" she asked, Wave motioning with his head at Tatsumi and Esdeath.

"It was all them." he said as he uncrossed his arms and shoved his hands into his pockets. "They were the ones to come up with the plan."

"How was Tatsumi able to convince Esdeath? She, of all people, would be the least likely to betray the Empire."

Wave shrugged. "To be honest, I don't know, but if I had to say...it's because of the feelings those two share for one another. You know she doesn't even torture people any more, thanks to him."

"Are you serious?"

Wave nodded and Najenda looked back at Esdeath with a baffled look, the memories of the Ice Queen allowing her men to raze the village of the Ban Tribe coming back to her almost instantly. The brutal sadist that inspired fear into those she attacked and tortured...was she well and truly gone? If so, what exactly did Tatsumi do to accomplish such a feat?

"I know it's hard to believe, but it's the truth. She loves him more than anything in the world, and that includes torturing people. Tatsumi told me after it happened but when he took her to the place where his best friends were murdered, he told her that she had to choose between that or being with him. And do you know what she chose?" he asked with a glance at Najenda, the Night Raid leader already knowing what he was going to say.

"It was him, wasn't it?" she said, Wave nodding.

"And since then she never stepped foot into another torture chamber ever again. She kept her promise, and by doing so she's become a much more cheerful and better person." he said before he turned around and walked off, wanting to find out where the two sisters were in the building and see if they were okay.

Najenda continued to look at Tatsumi and Esdeath from afar, the two currently laughing because of Lubbock getting punched by both Mine and Leone for probably saying a sex joke or something perverted. Seeing it as the opportune time to step in and talk with Esdeath herself she strolled over and smirked at seeing Lubbock gingerly rubbing his right shoulder, which had been hit by Leone.

"Hey, Esdeath, could I talk with you?" she asked, Esdeath looking up at her and after recognizing the look on her face she got up from her seat next to Tatsumi.

She followed her out of the living room and through the base until they arrived at a hallway lined with windows to the outside world, the sun's shining rays coming in through the glass and illuminating the base's interior.

"What is it Najenda?" she asked, Najenda pulling out a cigarette from the pack in her pocket and sticking it between her lips. "Wait, you smoke now?"

"Yeah, it's a bad habit, I know, but it helps me deal with the stress. Y'know, because I'm a rogue General that leads an organization of assassins and all." she replied with a smirk, Esdeath rolling her eyes at her in disdain.

"But anyways, I wanted to know something. Wave told me about how you tried to kill Honest and how Tatsumi was the one to come up with the idea." she started after lighting the cigarette and puffing out a small cloud of smoke to the side. "He also told me how you don't torture people any more, too."

Esdeath's stance stiffened somewhat and her expression softened, the word bringing back all of the memories that she had locked away. "Y-Yes, what about it?"

"I'm sorry about my doubt, but...I wanted to hear it from you. Is all of that true? How you gave up torturing and all after Tatsumi showed you what happened to his friends?" asked Najenda while she rested a hand on a nearby window sill and stared at her old friend.

Esdeath could still see the faces of her husband's friends in her mind and she shuddered slightly before calming herself down and fixing her gaze on Najenda. "Yes, it is."

"You love him that much?"

"More than anything. That's why I helped him try to kill Honest and why I protected and fought with him against Budo on the day of his execution. Actually, to prove that I was still loyal to the Empire, Budo was forcing me to be the one to kill him." said Esdeath, Najenda watching in silent awe as she brought a hand up to her chest close to her heart and smiled.

"At first, when we just starting out, I couldn't understand the feeling I had when I was around him. But as time went on and the closer we got, I finally realized what it was. I loved him, so much so that I was willing to threaten my position as a General in the Empire to help him. That's why I couldn't bring myself to kill him, I just couldn't."

Najenda, after Esdeath finished her story, stood speechless at the person that stood before her. She really had changed. Somehow, Tatsumi had managed to transform the Empire's most feared sadist who showed no mercy and relished in the pain and suffering of those she tortured, into, well, something else entirely. She was absolutely astonished.

" _Wow...I knew that Bulat could see you were special, but to think you would be able to do something like this…_ " she thought out of admiration for Tatsumi.

After inhaling another small portion of her cigarette she motioned with her right hand, the feeling of having an actual flesh and blood limb in the spot of her prosthetic arm still new to her, towards Esdeath and grinned.

"So, I overheard from your talk with Mine and the others that you're pregnant. How long?" she asked, Esdeath's blush returning as she looked down and rubbed her stomach with her left hand.

"Almost two months. Tatsumi thinks it'll be a girl." she replied, Najenda chuckling before turning and looking out the window to watch Solomon, Run and Chelsea return from surveying the area.

"Well then, I guess we better take down the Empire before she's born, hm?"

Esdeath looked up at Najenda and the smile she was giving her, chuckling to herself as the two walked away from the window to return to the living room and greet the others back. What Run, Chelsea, Solomon and even Lubbock's threads that he spread out throughout the area failed to notice, however, was the pair of eyes looking out from underneath a bush just past the edge of the treeline surrounding the clearing before the base.

They retreated back into the brush and the dog scampered back, its metal jaw making a clanking noise every so often as it made its way back to its master standing with the rest of its pack on the complete other side of the forest.

The dog leaped out from the trees and ran up to Copra, a hand raise from the hunter telling it to sit so he give the dog a pat on the head for determining the location of his prey.

"So, they're just beyond this forest eh?" he asked as he allowed the dog to rejoin the others behind him, his eyes gravitating up to the large mountain before him with the building cut out of its side.

He whistled twice, the dogs immediately spreading out into a wide arc to cover the forest's entire expanse. Copra grinned behind his mask as he hopped up onto his horse and grasped the handle of his weapon, no doubt a Teigu due to its unique appearance, tightly.

"Lie in wait until the time is right, my hounds. Wait until the moon has reached its zenith. That is when we shall strike."


	19. The Supreme Beast Hunter

A/N The Danger Beast Hunter Copra has finally caught up to his prey, and his pack of hounds sporting metal jaws with razor sharp teeth and closing in from all sides. This isn't looking good. But wait, all of you are probably thinking, "He's taking on both Night Raid and the Jaegers? He's gonna get his ass beat, DLG!" My friends, there is a reason why he has been able to take down all species of Danger Beasts, which include Super-Class variants. Also, for reference, the dogs that Copra has are reminiscent of a black doberman with cropped ears, only their eyes are blood red and glow in the darkness of night and the patches of fur that are normally brown are instead a dark purple. Basically, they aren't your ordinary run-of-the-mill dogs.

Also, I will be doing more work on the fanfic soon like having Copra's profile up and all alongside his appearance later because I recently just got back from a 10 day vacation to California, more specifically 3 days in San Diego, 3 days in LA, and 3 in San Fran plus 1 more to get back to where I leave, the good ole Lone Star State. I'll surely have it all up by Chapter 19's release. That's all for now, now peace my friends! Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 18 - The Supreme Beast Hunter**

 **\- Night Raid HQ -**

 **\- 12:00 a.m -**

When the moon reached the highest point in its ascent, and the inhabitants of the headquarters of Night Raid had all retired for the night, the real hunt finally began. Silently, all of the dogs save for one, the leader of the pack that was larger then the rest, approached the front entrance of the base with their ears standing on end and scanning the area for the slightest noise. The first dog to reach the door propped itself up on its hind legs and using the surgically implanted metal lower jaw it bit through the door's locks easily and spit them to the side, a pair of other dogs pushing open the doors with their heads.

They poured into the entry hall of the headquarters and sniffed the air a few times before diverging outward to cover the entire base and hunt down their prey one by one. A single dog crept down a long hallway lined with doors and came to one set between two columns, growling under its breath when he smelled the scent of a lion beyond it.

Just like with the front entrance it but off the doorknob and slowly pushed itself into the room, the moonlight from outside showing the outline of someone with blonde hair sleeping under the covers of the bed directly across from the door.

Saliva began to secrete from the dog's mouth as it approached the sleeping figure, its razor sharp teeth illuminated by the moon's glow as it got closer and closer to its victim. When it got within striking distance, the dog, like a bolt of lightning, the dog leaped onto the bed and lunged for the throat of the person, the metal teeth clamping down onto the skin and enabling the dog to thrash and rip its prey back and forth.

Blood splattered all over the bed as the dog continued to whip its head back and forth, the person's neck in its grasp getting thrown all over the place until finally a loud snap echoed out from its jaws, the dog finally removing its teeth from the person's neck now that it had finally snapped. Now that its prey had died, it was time to continue the search for the other people it had smelled earlier.

Before it could leave the room, however, it felt an overwhelming amount of rage come from behind and as a result it became rooted to the spot.

"Where the fuck do you think you're going?" asked a voice with a low, guttural growl as a large shadow encompassed the dog, followed by another flare of killer intent.

In another part of the base, Tatsumi suddenly awoke from his slumber and he looked around the room, his instincts telling him that what he just felt meant that something was off.

"Tatsumi…?" mumbled Esdeath as she pushed herself from the bed and rubbed her eyes.

She was going to ask what was wrong but after listening for a few seconds then grogginess she had instantly disappeared and she narrowed her eyes, the couple slowly climbing off the bed and staring straight at the door.

They waited in utter silence to see what would happen, and they tensed up when they heard the muffled sound of growling coming from just outside. Tatsumi summoned Tyrannus and clenched his fists around Neuntote's shaft while Esdeath formed an ice sword in her right hand and prepared herself to impale anything that came in through the door.

Another few seconds passed by and it suddenly got silent. _Dead_ silent. Then the door burst inward and five dogs came rushing in with their metal jaws spread wide open and their eyes blazing with the hunger of a feral predator.

The first dog to get near was instantly chopped in half by Tatsumi and the second had an ice sword shoved down its throat, courtesy of Esdeath. The remaining three dogs learned from the mistake of the first two and stayed back, snarling and baring their sharpened teeth at them while they recovered from the initial barrage.

Esdeath smirked however and she threw her arm forward, a swarm of icicles appearing in the air and shooting forward as quick as bullets, skewering one of the dogs and allowing Tatsumi the time he needed to rush the remaining two and cleave them both in two with a single swing of his spear.

"We need to find the others." said Esdeath as she discarded the ice sword and quickly fetched her rapier from the nightstand, Tatsumi and her running out of the room soon after.

They sprinted down the hallway for a few feet but came to a screeching halt when another group of dogs, three in total, foaming at the mouths and their red eyes glowing in the darkness, appeared from around the corner.

"Dammit, where the hell are these dogs coming from?!" growled Tatsumi in frustration as he got ready with Esdeath to take out the dogs.

Before they could, however, several threads and strands shot out from behind them and wrapped around the dog's throats, a swift tug from their origin snapping them all in one quick motion and immediately removing them as a threat.

"You guys alright?" asked Lubbock as he ran up with Leone at his side, the lioness growling as she tossed the broken body of the dog that had attacked her over with the rest of them.

"Yeah, we're fine." replied Tatsumi before he looked at Leone and the blood stains on her sleeping shirt and raised an eyebrow. "Let me guess, sneak attack?"

"You're damn fucking right." she replied with a snarl.

"Come on, we need to find the others. If we were both attacked by these dogs, then there has to be more of them throughout the base." said Esdeath as they took off past the dead corpses of the dogs Lubbock had killed.

If they had looked over their shoulders before leaving, they would've noticed four pairs of glowing eyes emerge from the room Tatsumi and Esdeath were sleeping in. The next thing they would've seen was that one of the dogs was still in the process of regenerating part of its chest after being impaled.

After a few minutes of running through the large building they came to the entry hall and witnessed a full on battle taking place between Night Raid, the Jaegers, and and at least thirty of the unknown dogs that had seemingly snuck in through the front door. One of the dogs leapt up and opened its mouth to bite down on Kurome's shoulder, but before it got even close Akame cut it clean in two with Murasame.

Esdeath, Tatsumi, Lubbock and Leone jumped down from the second floor to join in on the fray, and with their assistance they were able to take care of the rest of the mutts.

"Holy shit, those things are terrifying." said Wave as he deactivated Grand Chariot and looked around at all of the bloody corpses surrounding them, Najenda turning her attention to the front entrance and cursing.

"They were able to come in through there, and since all of these dogs have some sort of metal contraption on their jaws, these aren't just some random Danger Beasts. Someone must've sent them here to kill us all in our sleep."

"Could they be from the Empire?" asked Run after flying back down to the ground, Mastema's wings folding back into the two floating disks hovering behind him.

"Probably. But whoever they are, they know exactly what they're doing. They purposefully waited until we were all asleep before they sent in these dogs." stated Najenda darkly, the air growing tense.

That was when they all heard several growls come from upstairs where Tatsumi and Esdeath had come from, and they all turned around and watched eight dogs in total emerge from the darkness and stare down at them, teeth bared and drool pouring out of their mouths.

"Uh...guys?" asked Lubbock with a stutter as he took a few steps back.

"Yeah…?" asked Mine, her hands starting to shake somewhat when the dogs spread out among the second floor of the entry hall so they could surround them all and attack any side.

"How many of these dogs did you guys kill?"

"Maybe thirty, something like that. Why?" asked Kurome as Yatsufusa began to glow with a dark purple aura, Akame standing close beside her with Murasame.

They slowly began to inch their way back towards the doors of the base, the eight surviving dogs leaping down and hunkering down low, their ears pointing straight back.

"On our way here we killed nine, and since then we never saw a single dog afterwards." said Leone before the horror began to sink in, Tatsumi clenching his jaw muscles and grabbing onto Esdeath's hands so they wouldn't get separated.

"Then...that means…" uttered Wave when seemingly from the walls, roof and very air itself an ear-piercing howl shook the very foundation of the building and caused them all the cringe at its demonic nature.

Then, before their very eyes, the corpses of the dogs they thought were dead began to move and jerk frantically, the pieces slowly beginning to join together and become whole once again. Even the dog that Akame had cut down with Murasame merged together from two halves into one and got back onto its legs, its eyes glowing an even brighter shade of red now. Their snarls grew louder and louder as the dogs miraculously came back to life and began to creep towards them, the two groups having to step through the doorway and out into the open to avoid being cornered by the dogs.

"What the hell are these things?! Zombie dogs?!" stammered Lubbock as the dogs emerged from the building and began to encircle them, their red eyes never looking away from their prey while their metal jaws continued to clank with every other step they took.

From afar, way beyond the sight of his prey, Copra chuckled as he observed his dogs form a ring around them and start to close in, the fortieth dog and leader of the pack sitting behind him howling again to issue his last set of orders. When it finished the dog looked at its master and whimpered, Copra motioning with his hand and nodding.

"Go ahead. Enjoy yourself. I'll be there in a moment." he said, the dog wagging its tail before it took off down the small hill, racing into the forest surrounding Night Raid's HQ to join its pack before they attacked.

"Seems we're a little outnumbered here." muttered Tatsumi with a smirk as he twirled around Neuntote and tried to keep an eye on every single dog in his field of view, the others pressing their backs against one another so they wouldn't get attacked from behind.

To try and even the playing field a little, Kurome used Yatsufusa to summon a couple of her puppets, namely Natala, a gun-wielding assassin from the Northern Tribes named Doya, and a large apeman Danger Beast. When they tensed up after the dogs stopped circling them, they were surprised to see another dog, larger in size when compared to the others, emerge from the tree line several meters behind the ring and stride up to its companions with its teeth bared. Tatsumi noticed that unlike the others, the dog didn't possess a metal contraption on its jaws and that instead of having pitch black and purple fur, its fur was more feral looking and emerging from its head next to its cropped ears were small horns. Its tail was also incredibly long and it swished back and forth as the dog stared at them with its glowing red eyes.

"Seems we just found the pack leader." said Esdeath with a grin when the ring broke apart to allow the larger dog to join the ranks of the pack and utter a deep growl.

Suddenly, to their horror, the skin around the dog's neck on the left side began to bulge and grow until finally a second head emerged and howled, saliva dripping from its teeth after the skin settled down and its freshly created eyes blinking. Then on the other side of the dog's neck the same thing occurred and soon enough the dog now had three heads in total, each one growling and snarling at them.

"Well, I just reached a whole new level of creeped out." muttered Lubbock, Mine lifting Pumpkin up and aiming its barrel right at the pack leader.

"You're one to talk." she replied, the dogs beginning to circle around them again now that their pack leader had arrived to assist in the assault.

"Esdeath, any thoughts?" asked Najenda with a glance over her shoulder, Esdeath's grin widening when the adrenaline began to kick in.

"The master for these dogs has to be nearby, especially since the pack leader just arrived. He's skilled too since I can sense his presence, but to be able to coordinate them he'll have to be somewhere that has an unrestricted view of the clearing." she replied, her eyes already scanning the surrounding landscape for any possible locations for the dog's master.

"Run, care to help?" asked Solomon, the blonde nodding before taking to the skies, Mastema's wings taking him far above the trees and giving him a full view over the entire area.

"There! I can see a figure standing at least two kilometers from here on a hill!" he shouted, Tatsumi immediately glancing back at Esdeath and nodding.

She closed her eyes and brought her hands up to the tattoo on her chest, a dark orb of blue energy manifesting between the palms. At that moment the dogs charged all at once, ready to clamp their teeth down onto their flesh and rip them apart.

"Mahapadma!" she exclaimed, the blue orb rapidly expanding to cover the entire area and freeze everything it touched.

Well, everything except for her and Tatsumi. Tyrannus, after it evolved during their battle with Budo, gained a resistance to the effects of her Trump Card and allowed for him to move around freely within the frozen space just like Esdeath.

"Good luck." he said as he grabbed her by the hips and tossed her in the direction Run had pointed out, the effects of Mahapadma wearing off a few seconds later as soon as she vanished.

In the blink of an eye Tatsumi swung Neuntote out and cleaved the first dog to reach him in half, the other Jaegers and Night Raid members taking on the rest of the dogs at the same time he did. The plan was to buy Esdeath time to take out the dog's master and hopefully cause them to retreat, but little did any of them know that before she had cast her Trump Card, a pair of dogs had already disappeared back into the forest upon hearing the call of the person controlling them.

After flying through the air for a few moments Esdeath's bare feet struck the soft grass of the hill Tatsumi had thrown her towards and she tucked into a roll, coming to a stop on one knee with her rapier at her side and a scowl on her face. Standing before her on a majestic brown horse was the dog's master, a man whose face was hidden behind a pitch black mask.

"Ah, General Esdeath, it's a pleasure to meet you. Well, I should say former General, that is." said the man as he hopped off the horse and patted it on the side, the steed galloping off so it wouldn't get in the way.

"Who are you? Why are you attacking us?" she asked, her rapier's sharp tip pointed right at the man's throat.

"Of course, where are my manners?" the man said before he bowed. "My name is Copra, and I'm famously known throughout the Empire as the Supreme Beast Hunter."

Esdeath's scowl morphed into a grin and she relaxed her stance somewhat, the man's reputation coming back to her. "Ah, I know you. The man whose hunted down and killed every known and unknown species and class of Danger Beast, correct?"

"Indeed, that is I." replied Copra with a nod.

"And I'm assuming you've been sent here by the Empire to hunt us down?" asked Esdeath as she started to walk in a circle, Copra doing the same with his hand on the hilt of his weapon.

"Yes, unfortunately. I've heard everything there is to know about your military accomplishments, and just being in your presence is a huge honor."

Esdeath chuckled at the flattery and she waved it aside, saying, "Thank you, but I no longer work nor care for that life any more. There's something else I love more now."

Copra looked away from her eyes and noticed the ring on her hand and had a realization, the hunter slowly nodding. "I see. Congratulations."

"You know, I wanted to ask you something. Your pets, I can see that they're aren't your ordinary run-of-the-mill dogs. Care to enlighten me?" asked Esdeath as they continued to circle one another.

"Indeed, they are special. They're a special breed of Danger Beast that I discovered back when I was hunting an elusive Super-Class in the Western Nations. They have an uncanny ability to heal themselves and, as shown with the pack leader, they can grow out portions of the their body to create new limbs and such. I took a mother back with me and I breeded them, turning them into my loyal hunting dogs whom I love very dearly." explained Copra before he stopped walking and pulled his weapon off of his belt, Esdeath eying the strange bone-like weapon carefully.

"But enough talk, let's get to the fight, shall we?"

"I couldn't agree more." said Esdeath as she readied herself, the slight exhaustion she felt after using her Trump Card earlier fading away now that she had some rest during their chat.

Copra stared at her from behind his mask before he whistled loudly, the former General raising an eyebrow in confusion before she heard the trees rustle behind her. She reacted too slow and one of the two dogs that had ran back to assist their master leaped out from the foliage, its metal teeth clamping down onto her right shoulder digging deep into her skin. She snarled and threw the dog off, an icicle she formed in the air impaling it through the gut a second later and pinning it to the ground.

She growled at Copra as her injured arm hung limp at her side, the tendons controlling its movement in her shoulder now damaged to the point she couldn't move her arm any more, let alone feel it.

"Well, I didn't say anything about fighting fair. I am going up against the Empire's Strongest, after all." stated Copra when the second hound trotted up next to him and snarled, its fallen brother yelping and whimpering as a result of the icicle plunged through its side.

" _Dammit, I should've expected he would pull something like this._ " she thought as she pushed aside the agonizing pain in her shoulder and switched hands, her rapier now in her right instead of the left.

"Behold my Teigu, the weapon that's enabled me to establish my reputation as the Supreme Beast Hunter." said Copra as he threw his arm to the side, the weapon instantly extending itself out and becoming rigid, Esdeath's gaze moving from him to the serrated edges of each individual section of the spinal-cord he called his weapon. "Basilisk, I have new prey for you to kill!"

In an instant Copra rushed Esdeath with the sword at his side, the hound staying right next to him so they could attack her at the same time.

"Don't take me for a fool!" yelled Esdeath before she crouched down, a column of ice emerging beneath her and propelling her high up into the air and far out of the reach of the hunter.

"Hagelsprung!"

Copra's eyes widened in shock when a massive pillar of ice that easily dwarfed the hill manifested in the air behind Esdeath, the Ice Queen grinning as she propelled it straight towards him and his dog. Reacting purely on instinct he looked right and had Basilisk extend itself out, the weapon becoming flexible again so it could wrap around the trunk of a tree and pull him sharply to the side just in time to avoid the impact of the hunk of ice.

When the dust settled he was instantly assaulted by the former General, her rapier striking his blade several times and causing him to stumble backward from the force of the blows. He quickly realized that injuring her hadn't worked out like he had hoped when she kicked him hard in the gut and knocked the wind out of him.

"Grauhorn!" she said, the very tip of the ice pillar she intended to have impale the hunter emerging from the ground first and rushing right at him.

To her shock however, his back cracked several times and he bent backwards so unnaturally one would think he had just broken his own spinal cord to avoid the attack. As the ice flew by his mask, the clearance probably just a few inches, he rolled to the side and glared at her.

"As expected of you, Esdeath. You really _are_ the most dangerous game." he said through heavy breaths after his spine reconnected itself, Esdeath growling as she returned to her full height.

There was definitely something special with him and that weapon of his, and the more she fought him the easier it would be for her to figure out just what exactly it was.

"I know what you're trying to do. I won't allow it! Merzkiy Zmeya Pozitsiya - Kobra!" he yelled, Esdeath immediately bringing her blade up to block a downward slash from the hunter.

She was caught off guard and grunted from the extreme force put behind the slash, her feet sinking into the ground a little. Copra pressed his advantage and spun around, his blade rising high up into the air again for another attack that would be just as power, if not even more powerful then the last. Esdeath rolled to the side to avoid the slash and she watched the tip of Basilisk smash into the ground and dig itself probably three feet under, a small crater forming soon after from the force of the blow.

" _I can't get caught underneath another blow like that. My sword wouldn't have been able to withstand that second strike at all._ " she thought while Copra removed his weapon from the earth and stared at her.

"Merzkiy Zmeya Pozitsiya - Konstriktor." he said before he lunged out at her with Basilisk, attacking her with several slashes and sweeps directed at her waist and legs.

When she blocked one aimed right at her stomach with a wall of ice her eyes widened when she remembered that if she got hurt, there was a possibility that the child currently forming inside of her would get hurt as well. That thought alone caused a change inside of her, and she showed it by pushing back against Copra's barrage of attacks and lunging at his gut with her sword with a look of rage painted on her face.

The hunter sidestepped the attack and smirked since she had just opened herself up, but contrary to his assumption she continued moving past him and leaped forward. When she landed on her feet she glanced back over her shoulder with a heavy scowl, several shards of ice materializing around her and growing larger and larger.

Soon they joined together and continued to grow, eventually forming into rows upon rows of sharpened icicles that were all pointed straight at Copra. The hunter took a few steps back, the sheer amount of ice she was creating beginning to give him an uneasy feeling. It only got worst when the Ice Queen began to secrete an enormous amount of killer intent, the air itself seemingly doubling in weight and making it hard to breath.

"This fight ends now." she murmured, the two rows of icicles behind her doubling again. "You'll pay for threatening me and my allies with your life."

With a single fluid movement she sent every single icicle out at once, Copra extending Basilisk out and swinging the snake-like sword through the air in an attempt to defend himself from the onslaught. Several icicles made it past his weapon and cut through his clothes and armor, creating deep gashes that if he hadn't worn armor would've easily cut skin, and it seemed that these cuts would be the only injury he would receive.

That all changed when Esdeath manipulated one of the icicles as it flew through the air just slightly and grinned when it flew straight and true right through the hunter's left thigh, splattering his blood onto the grass beneath him and causing him to collapse onto one knee and groan in pain. Before he could stand back up, Esdeath was right on top of him with her hand planted right on the surface of his mask and a malicious smile on her face.

"Freeze." she said in almost a whisper, Copra crying out as his body began to freeze from his feet upward.

Esdeath removed her hand once his head was encased in ice and stepped back, admiring her work for a few moments before she cringed and reached up to her injured shoulder again, the skin incredibly tender to the touch and the blood it was secreting now dripping off her right hand.

" _I need to get back to the others._ " she thought after clenching her teeth and ignoring the pain so she could run back towards Night Raid's base.

When she arrived back at the clearing she was met by a sight that gave her an overwhelming amount of relief, mainly due to the fact that Tatsumi was unharmed, but seeing how the others had made it out with only minor injuries was good as well.

Once Tatsumi deactivated Tyrannus and saw Esdeath walking towards him with her shoulder in the state it was in, he sprinted over to her with a terrified expression on his face.

"I'm fine, really. I just need Solomon to heal this for me." she said with a small smile, Tatsumi frowning at her sternly before he called over Solomon.

Soon enough the injury was a thing of the past and Esdeath moved her arm around to make sure everything was in working order while Najenda checked up with everyone else. Once they were all accounted for, Esdeath finally realized that the dogs they had all been fighting were gone.

"What happened to all the dogs?" she asked.

"They ran away with the pack leader once they heard a loud cry in the distance." said Tatsumi as he walked her back to the doors of the building, the others following behind. "Was that the person controlling them?"

"Yes. He was a Danger Beast hunter named Cobra, and he used a Teigu called Basilisk that looks like a spinal cord."

"That sounds disgusting." said Chelsea with a disgruntled look when they all walked inside, Susanoo closing the doors behind them and standing in front of them to act as a barrier in case the dogs came back.

"But if the dogs did indeed run back to him, I have no doubt in my mind that they'll be able to break the ice I froze him in with those metal teeth." stated Esdeath before she turned and looked at Najenda directly. "And now that he knows the location of this place, he can easily leave and bring back an entire army of Imperial Soldiers, maybe even my own army. You know what this means, right?"

Najenda nodded with a grim expression and without even issuing an order, they all split up and returned to their rooms to gather up their stuff and anything else they thought would be needed. They met back in the entry hall, the only thing they had left to do was decide on where they should go from here.

"This is exactly like when that crazy scientist guy attacked us, only this time it was a bunch of psycho zombie dogs." growled Leone while she crossed her arms across her chest.

"Dr. Stylish?" questioned Esdeath, Leone glancing at her with a wary expression. "Don't worry, we didn't really enjoy his company either."

"Where do we go now? Do you have any other secret bases to go to?" asked Wave, Najenda shaking her head and crossing her arms.

"No, not currently. And I doubt the Revolutionary Army can spare us anything right now because of what happened to them at the Shisuikan."

"So...we're on our own?" asked Kurome, Akame putting a hand on her shoulder and squeezing it.

"Don't worry, we've scouted out a ton of potential hiding spots in case something like this would happen again. Good thing, huh Boss?" said Mine with a smirk as she adjusted the strap on her shoulder for the carrying case of Pumpkin.

"Yes. What we'll do is head towards the southeastern coastline of the Empire and lay low there. At the very least we may have a run-in with the Imperial Navy, but I wouldn't worry too much about them since it's the weakest branch of the Empire's military." said Najenda, who quickly realized afterward what she said and rubbed the back of her neck while glancing over at Wave. "Uh, no offense."

"None taken…" he replied, his pride at being a former member of the Imperial Navy now shot.

"Let's get going before that guy comes back. I'd rather not see those dogs again…" muttered Solomon with a shiver, the sight of the dog that attacked him in his sleep definitely going to haunt him for the rest of his life.

They left the base behind and started heading southeast, hoping that they would be able to get as far away from their enemies as possible. And just like Esdeath had guessed, the dogs had returned to their master and using their metal jaws they broke through the ice and were able to free Copra from its confines.

"Thank you." he said before grunting when he pulled his injured leg out from the remaining ice and flinched.

He put all of his weight onto his other leg and pat the pack leader on the head a few times before he sucked up the pain and limped over to the horse he had used to get here, which had surprisingly survived the engagement with Esdeath thanks to its survival instrument. He painfully pulled himself up onto its back and whistled for his dogs to gather around him so he could begin the trek back to the Imperial Capital and receive treatment for his wound...and so he could report to Jacqueline about what he discovered tonight.

* * *

A/N For those who need translations, since Copra's moves are in Russian.

Merzkiy Zmeya Pozitsiya - Kobra - Vile Snake Stance - Cobra

Merzkiy Zmeya Pozitsiya - Konstriktor - Vile Snake Stance - Constrictor


	20. Demonic Savagery

A/N That's one dog I would not want to go up against, yikes. But still not as scary as Kuro, FUCK THAT THING. I also have Copra and his Teigu, Basilisk, done on the Wiki. Go check him out. Btw, the pack leader dog is based off a Great Dane, for your information. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 19 - Demonic Savagery**

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

 **\- Three Hours later -**

It was still night out when Copra managed to return to the Imperial Capital on his horse, his hounds sticking close by his side as he entered through the main gate and made his way towards the nearest hospital. He payed no attention to the looks he received as a result of the strange appearance of his dogs and upon reaching a hospital he was instantly admitted when he told them he was working with the Great General. After receiving treatment for his wound and taking some painkillers he walked out of the hospital and turned his attention to the Imperial Palace in the center of the city.

It only took him a few minutes to get there since not that many people were out and about at this time of night, so when he reached the protective wall built around the palace grounds he dismounted his horse and was let past by the Imperial Guards after he told them his affiliation. The pack leader stayed by his side as he limped his way up to the entrance and walked inside, making his way to the throne room and lowering his hood when he recognized Kahfka standing next to the doors.

"Why hello there, long time no see." he said as he approached her, the girl perking up at the sound of his voice and grinning.

"You're back? Did you find the Jaegers?" she asked, Copra nodding before he motioned to the closed throne rooms.

"Is Miss Jacqueline inside talking to the Emperor?" he asked, Kahfka shaking her head and blowing a strand of hair out of her face.

"No, just the Prime Minister. Do you need to tell her something?"

"Yes, it's imperative that I do." said Copra seriously, Kahfka pushing herself off the wall and knocking three times on the door.

Not even a second passed before the pair of Faceless inside pushed open the doors and allowed Copra to walk in. Jacqueline, who was standing before the throne which Honest stood next to, turned and was surprised to see him back...and without the Jaegers.

"Copra...why are you here?" she asked, confused as to why he had come back without anything to show.

"Sorry, Miss, but I have some important news that I believe will benefit you and the Prime Minister here." said the hunter with a bow to both of them, Honest grinning slightly as he laid eyes upon the man.

"Well then speak."

Copra cleared his throat and he held his hands behind his back, saying, "I discovered the location of the Jaegers after tracking them for the past week. They were holed up within a secret base built into the side of a mountain around twenty kilometers from the Imperial Capital. And from what I could tell, the people who owned and operated the base were none other then the assassin organization Night Raid."

At the mentioning of the Empire's archnemesis besides the Revolutionary Army, Jacqueline froze and the Prime Minister's eyes widened in disbelief. Even the Inquisitor cracked open his eye and glared over at the hunter, the name like a taboo among them all.

"Night...Raid?" asked Jacqueline as if she had no idea what they were. "Did you at least kill some of them?"

Copra's posture slackened and the dog at his side whimpered somewhat, recognizing that its master was visibly stressed. "Ah, no, Miss. They all took on my hunting dogs and were able to hold their own, and Esdeath was able to defeat me in combat."

Jacqueline's left eye twitched and Copra immediately realized that telling her of his failure had been a grave mistake. The pack leader at his side whimpered when it sensed the air grow tense and it backed off when the Great General fully turned around and glared at Copra with an unhinged look in her eyes.

"You failed...even when you had the advantage in numbers. Pitiful." she said viciously as Honest lost the shocked expression and grinned when he saw that things were progressing down the same path as before with the General that had doubted her.

"I guess to actually have these things accomplished, you'll have to do them yourself." sighed Jacqueline before she formed two sharpened bone protrusions, one in each hand, and smiled. "You're relieved from duty, Hunter. I have no need for you any more."

Copra took a step back and he instantly grasped Basilisk tightly in his hand, the black spinal cord sword extending out into its blade form.

"Is that your Teigu?" asked Jacqueline, Copra gulping nervously when she returned the bones in her hands back into her arms and reached over her shoulder with her right hand. "That's interesting, because, mine allows me to make something almost exactly like that…"

Copra had no idea what she meant before she cocked her head sharply to the right and a loud snap echoed out, the hunter cringing and watching in utter disgust as the skin at the base of her neck split apart and began to push out the end of her own spine. She grasped onto it and with one swift motion she pulled out her spine, the bone instantly rebuilding itself after she removed it so she could move again, and swung it through the air.

It was at least twice the length of a normal human spinal cord and he guessed that she grew it out with whatever her Teigu was. They stared each other down, Honest crossing his arms in anticipation of the duel that would take place between the Supreme Beast Hunter and the Great General. This was going to be entertaining.

"Your hunt ends today, Copra!" announced Jacqueline before she leaped up into the air and reared back her arm, the spinal cord in her grasp curling back like a whip ready to be snapped at an animal.

She threw her arm out and the spine lunged at Copra, the hunter bringing up Basilisk to block the attack. To his surprise the spinal cord wrapped around his weapon and Jacqueline sneered as she tugged with only one arm, Copra unable to keep a hold on his weapon and growling when she pulled it out of his grasp.

She caught the weapon with her free hand and she tested its weight, Copra smirking behind his mask as he waited for Basilisk to reject her and impale her hand with spikes that would emerge out from the handle. However, this thought slowly faded away as more time passed by and Jacqueline wasn't attacked by his Teigu.

"This is a wonderfully made weapon...I think I'll take it." she said as she fixed her gaze on Copra again. "I appreciate the gift."

Before he could react, Jacqueline swung her spinal cord at him and wrapped its end around his left leg, a harsh tug hurling him towards her. His entire life flashed before his eyes as he watched her bring Basilisk around right for his gut, and in that moment he realized what he had to do.

Even if he ended up dying later...he needed to tell the Jaegers and Night Raid of just how powerful Jacqueline was.

So before she could bifurcate him, he maneuvered himself just enough to when he finally reached her, he sucked in a breath and the scream that would've come when he felt Basilisk rip through his arm and cut it clean off from the bicep down. He tumbled across the ground and clutched the bleeding stump he now had, Jacqueline giggling as she turned around and licked away the blood that had splattered on her face.

"So you do have a will to live...I was wondering if you were going to break too early or not." she said as Copra picked himself up off the ground and stumbled a bit, his vision blurry as a result of the blood pouring out of his wound.

He looked to his left and saw the pack leader staring at him with wide eyes, the look on the dog's face telling him that it was willing to help. He chuckled and he looked right at Jacqueline, the Great General raising an eyebrow and waiting for him to do something.

She wasn't expecting him to start laughing.

"You...all of you…they're going to kill you. The Jaegers, Night Raid...they'll kill you and turn this Empire back into what it should be." he said in the midst of his laughter.

Jacqueline stared at him with a confused look on her face before she started to laugh at the sheer absurdity of his statement, Copra growing silent the louder her laugh got. She wiped a fake tear from her eye and grinned at how helpless the supposed Supreme Beast Hunter was right now before her.

"That, my friend, was hilarious. Kill me, you say? Hehe, as I am right now...there's no way that they could kill me. Not even Esdeath."

Copra was suddenly paralysed when she released an enormous amount of killer intent, so much that it actually began to take of a distinct form behind her. It was dark, almost pitch black, and as she gave off more and more it started to look like some sort of demon with sharp fangs and glowing eyes.

"Now, little hunter, please...allow me to escort you to the torture chambers." said Jacqueline with a giggle as she slowly approached Copra with weapons in hand, the hunter slowly backing away.

He looked back at the pack leader and he slowly nod his head, the dog returning the gesture as it bared its fangs and grew out its two other hands unbeknownst to Jacqueline and the Inquisitor.

"To be honest, Miss Jacqueline, I'd rather not go there." replied Copra with a chuckle before he whistled loudly, Jacqueline getting caught off guard for a moment before she heard a loud snarl and she turned to her left.

The pack leader lunged at her and tackled her to the ground, allowing Copra to sprint for the throne room doors. The two Faceless guarding it attempted to attack him with their halberds but he easily avoided their swings, ramming his shoulder into the doors to push them open and continue out past Kahfka.

"Inquisitor!" bellowed Jacqueline angrily as she kicked the hound off of her.

The Inquisitor's eyes shot open and he removed Brahmastra from his shoulder, taking a single step to the right and aiming down its scope right for Copra. He fired a single bolt of plasma that pierced through Copra's side and left behind a scorching hole, the hunter stumbling a few feet as he left the hall before the throne room.

"What the hell just happened?" exclaimed Kahfka as she came running in, her eyes instantly flying to the three-headed dog snarling and growling at Jacqueline.

But instead of being afraid or worried, she was smiling and staring at the dog as she let go of the spinal cord in her hand and coiled up Basilisk in the other. Without saying a word she flared her killer intent again and very quickly the dog succumbed to her will and whimpered, the Great General walking forward and petting it on the head a few times.

"Good dog. Now go find the rest of your pack and follow your old master for me, will you?" she asked nicely, the dog wagging its tail and scampering out of the throne room.

She pushed aside some stray locks of her hair and turned to the Prime Minister, a grin on her face. "I'll be back. I apologize for getting blood on the carpet, by the way."

Jacqueline began to walk towards the throne room doors after the pack leader, motioning with her hand to Kahfka to follow. The two left the throne room behind and started to run to be able to catch up with the hounds that would be pursuing Copra, the Inquisitor remaining to finish discussing certain things with Honest.

Meanwhile, the hunter himself was cursing endlessly when he heard the howl of his dogs come from behind and he knew that their allegiance must've changed, so the only thing he could do now was continue to run. The hit he had gotten from the Inquisitor's weapon had knocked the wind out of him and it was making it incredibly difficult to breath, but he thanked god that the wound had instantly cauterized itself since it was pure plasma that had struck him.

" _I have to find Esdeath!_ " he thought as he rounded a corner on his horse and headed straight for the open gate leading out of the capital, the sound of the hounds chasing him slowly fading away.

He knew that after he had attacked Night Raid and the Jaegers they would head somewhere farther away from the Imperial Capital, so after he remembered the position of the base itself and the direction the city was from it, he deduced that they could've only headed to the southeast, towards the coastline.

" _I managed to get away from them, at least, for now that is._ " he thought before he removed his mask for a second to spit up some blood. " _Damn, I'm losing blood fast...I hope I can stay awake long enough to reach them…_ "

 **\- Southeastern Lands of the Empire -**

 **\- Four Days Later -**

"Man, how far is the coast anyways? My feet are killing me!" complained Lubbock as they pushed their way through some underbrush, Leone and Mine rolling their eyes.

They had been moving nonstop since the Danger Beast Hunter had attacked Night Raid's secret base of operations., only resting for a couple of hours at most during the day and travelling most of the time at night. And thankfully they never had to worry about having a shortage of food considering they met a Danger Beast every so often and ended up killing it to sustain their hunger.

"How about you quit your complaining and just keep walking? Does that sound like a good idea everybody?" asked Chelsea irritably.

"I second that." added in Solomon with the raise of a hand, everyone else laughing while Lubbock mumbled something under his breath and frowned.

They cut their way through another layer of trees and came to a small clearing that could serve as a good resting spot for the moment, so they put their stuff down in the center and found their own individual spots to sit and recover for a few. Tatsumi and Esdeath chose to sit with their backs up against a nearby tree, his arm wrapped around her and her head resting on his shoulder.

Run, Wave, Akame and Kurome all sat next to one another in the grass across from Solomon, Lubbock, Mine and Leone, all of them listening to the former drifter's stories of travelling across the Empire. Moments like this were what allowed them to get further past the differences that the two organizations once felt between each other and, to be honest, it was quite pleasant. It was everything Tatsumi had hoped for and more.

"Well, Gazia should be meeting up with us shortly." said Najenda with a sigh as she took a seat close to Tatsumi and Esdeath, Susanoo remaining close at hand with his eyes closed.

"Good. He'll be a valuable asset to have back considering that Teigu of his." said Esdeath, Najenda nodding and looking back down at the right hand she had regained alongside the rest of her arm and eye.

"You know, it still feels weird to have two eyes and two arms back. I got so used to having that prosthetic arm and eye patch that having my own flesh back is alien to me." she said before motioning back towards Solomon with her other hand. "How exactly was he able to do something like that, anyways?"

"It's the Trump Card of his Teigu. His blood can instantly regenerate itself and heal any injury he sustains, even decapitation. And we found out after he fixed Wave's broken back that he can heal others with it too." replied Tatsumi, Najenda becoming astonished by such a powerful ability.

"Amazing."

They sat there for a few more minutes, the sun bathing them in its warm glow as it passed overhead. It was a beautiful day to just relax, and it would've kept being one too if Esdeath hadn't felt a familiar presence approaching them, only...it was weak, _very_ weak.

"Someone's coming." she said, her attitude making a complete one eighty to a battle-ready serious mode as she stood up alongside Tatsumi.

"Is it Copra?" asked Najenda, Tatsumi nodding when he felt the presence too.

Najenda spread the word and everybody got their Teigu ready to fight the Danger Beast Hunter and his pack of hounds, and after a few minutes of silence they could hear the rustling of bushes and leaves directly in front of them. Mine looked down the scope of Pumpkin and waited for their enemy to appear so she could put a bolt of spirit energy right through his head, but when he finally did they were all thrown for a loop.

Copra emerged from the trees and had to support himself on one of them due to his weakened state, the pain he was feeling from both his side and where his arm had been severed making it hard to walk.

"What the hell happened to you?" asked Wave cautiously, the Danger Beast Hunter coughing vigorously as he stumbled forward like a drunkard.

"All of you...you need to get away from here, now. They...they got my horse..." he said through labored breaths, Tatsumi looking at Esdeath and then back to the man with a confused expression.

"What do you mean?" he asked, Copra coughing again as he collapsed to his left knee and shuddered.

"She...she's coming for you…"

"Who?" asked Esdeath, wanting to get as much information out of the man before he ultimately keeled over from blood loss.

Unfortunately for them, Copra let out one last breath before he fell onto his side and ceased all movement whatsoever. Tatsumi cursed under his breath at not being able to figure out who the hunter had been referring too, but he quickly got a faint idea when he heard the howling of a dog close by.

"We need to move, now!" shouted Najenda and Esdeath at the same time, the two groups instantly sprinting away from Copra's body.

They pushed aside anything that got in their way and ran as fast as they could, but still they heard the sound of dogs barking behind them, meaning that whoever had followed Copra had shifted their attention to them. And judging from the injuries he had and how he had talked of a "she"...they couldn't be friendly.

Lubbock pushed on ahead to scout for anything coming and he almost had a heart attack when he flew into the air off the edge of a ravine, his reflexes automatically making his arm unleash several threads of Cross Tail to snag the branch of a tree on the other side and swinging himself across.

Once he landed on his feet and turned around and yelled at the top of his lungs, "Cliff!"

Thanks to his warning, Esdeath was able to come to a complete stop and slap her palms to the ground, a bridge of ice immediately springing forward and connecting to the other side. The others showed up and they were about to cross the makeshift bridge before a blur emerged from the tree line and shot out over them, coming down on the bridge between where they stood and the other side of the ravine.

Tatsumi held his arms out to stop everyone as the figure stood up and brandished a strange looking blade, her long white hair blowing softly in the wind passing through the ravine.

"You almost got away...almost." she said with a smirk, Esdeath narrowing her eyes at her and reaching for her rapier.

"Uh, guys! Look behind you!" shouted Lubbock frantically, Akame and Kurome whirling around to see the pack of hounds they had heard emerge from the tree line.

Their metal teeth were bared and they snarled at them, the pack leader glaring at them with its red eyes when it recognized them.

"Are you the one who injured Copra?" asked Run as the girl with white hair shifted her weight on the ice bridge.

"No, I just watched. But now that I've got you cornered...Jacqueline, they're here!" she announced with a devilish grin, Esdeath's eyes widening when the name sparked an old memory within her mind.

Suddenly, from behind the pack of dogs blocking them on one side of the bridge, a murderous killer intent seemed to waft out from the trees themselves and choke them, the dogs themselves starting to whimper and back away from whatever was coming. They all turned around and watched as another woman with auburn hair appeared from behind a tree with a smile on her face, the dogs moving aside to let her past. She came to a stop at the edge of the ice bridge and observed them all, taking in the looks on their faces until she finally came to rest on Esdeath.

"Hello, Esdeath. It's been awhile since we last met, hasn't it?" she asked, Tatsumi looking back at his wife and seeing the shocked expression on her face.

"You know her?" he asked.

"Of course she does! She didn't tell any of you?" asked Jacqueline with a giggle, her killer intent fading away as she placed a hand on her hip. "I'm hurt, Esdeath. I thought my old superior would at least share a little bit of information about her former subordinates to her new ones."

Everyone's jaws dropped to the ground, another portion of the person's identity being revealed to them in the most shocking way. Apparently this woman had previously served in Esdeath's army, and from what they could tell she was the one who had injured and inadvertently caused Copra to die considering she was in possession of his hounds now.

"You look...different." said Esdeath in a low tone, her feelings about the situation getting worse and worse.

"Yes, I did indeed change over the years. I do have some good news to share with you though. I got promoted to Great General, and I had a lot of fun ripping apart those pathetic traitors that call themselves the Revolutionary Army." said Jacqueline happily, Najenda's eyes widening and her heart skipping a beat.

 _She_ was the one that attacked the Shisuikan and killed hundreds, if not thousands of soldiers from the Revolutionary Army? And seeing her just talking so casually about killing people she considered allies, friends even, it lit a fire inside her and caused her to snarl. Jacqueline noticed her and she raised an eyebrow, her smile disappearing for a moment and getting replaced with a fake look of empathy.

"Ah...you must be the leader of Night Raid, the former General Najenda. Did I kill someone you know at the Shisuikan?" she asked, Najenda's fists tightening until her knuckles turned white.

Jacqueline noticed Akame and Kurome standing in the group and she looked over them at Kahfka and pointed at them. "Hey, Kahfka, Akame and Kurome from the Elite Seven and Group of Terror are here too. You three are basically family."

The two sisters glanced back over their shoulders at Kahfka and she smiled at them, giving them a wink as she rocked back and forth on her heels. They could only assume that she used to be a member of either assassination team, but if that was the case...why was she alive and the others weren't?

"You...you were there when they died. Najasho, all of them…" stuttered Akame, Kahfka nodding.

"Don't worry, Akame, Kurome, they all died doing the only thing they could." stated Jacqueline to draw their attention back to her. "Although, it was futile either way."

"Bastard!" snarled Leone, the Great General laughing at her.

"Well, it was fun talking with all of you, but that's all the time I have for that." said Jacqueline with a sigh before her killer intent came back even more powerful and noxious.

To their horror her grin morphed into an insane smile as she held a hand out to them all and giggled, her eyes widening to give her the look of a psychotic murderer, "Allow me to take you all back to the torture chambers. I'll enjoy tearing you all apart, especially you...Esdeath."

Tatsumi was instantly consumed by Tyrannus, his desire to kill her for threatening Esdeath and the others shooting through the roof, but to his surprise Esdeath held a hand out and stepped forward with a blank expression on her face. He said nothing and watched as she drew her rapier and pointed it at her former subordinate, Jacqueline raising an eyebrow out of interest at what she was doing.

"Najenda, get everyone else out of here. Head to the coastal city of Caern, we'll meet you there." she said, Tatsumi following up by glancing back at her and nodding his head.

"We'll cover you guys."

Najenda looked at the duo for a few seconds before she sighed and turned towards Lubbock, who was still standing on the other side of the ravine with his eyes glued to the back of Kahfka's head.

"You two better come back."

"Did I tell you all you could leave?" asked Jacqueline as she snapped her fingers, Kahfka bringing up her weapon and smirking at Run and Wave, who were still looking at her.

Suddenly several threads wrapped around her arms and body, binding her and keeping them at her sides. Lubbock tightened Cross Tail's threads and he urged them to cross while he had her arms restricted, Najenda taking a moment to take one last glance at Esdeath and Tatsumi before running across the ice bridge and joining Lubbock in escaping the area.

Kahfka growled in frustration before she vanished in a flash of purple, reappearing a couple of feet away freed of Cross Tail's threads and giving chase after them through the forest. When she vanished into the trees, Tatsumi stepped up next to Esdeath and glared at Jacqueline with Neuntote in his grasp, the Great General looking at them both and crossing her arms.

"Oh, you're no fun. I wanted to kill all of you at once." she pouted, Tatsumi growling under his breath.

Jacqueline's personality was almost exactly like the one Esdeath used to have, only...it was a whole lot worse. Esdeath, at that time, still had some humanity left, but this person...she was truly a monster who didn't care who she killed and if they had families or not. And he also assumed that when she told them that she would take them all to the torture chambers, she must be a bloodthirsty sadist as well.

" _Great...just great…_ " he thought morbidly as he watched Jacqueline reach down and take off the black heels she wore.

She tossed them to the side and stretched her toes in the grass, her next action being to wave her hand at the dogs standing on either side of her and dismiss them. The pack leader barked once before trotting off with the rest of the hounds, their servitude to the Great General now over.

"Now...let's see if you'll be able to entertain me more then that hunter could." she said with a smile, her arms crossing over her chest in anticipation.

With only a glance between them, Tatsumi and Esdeath rushed Jacqueline and attacked her simultaneously with her rapier and his spear. The Great General laughed as she deflected the rapier with her hand and sidestepped the spear, spinning around and ramming her heel into Tatsumi's ribcage and blowing him away with super-human strength. Esdeath growled and swung at Jacqueline's throat, the woman ducking underneath it and backflipping away from immediate danger.

"Jacqueline!" shouted Esdeath as she fired a storm of icicles at her, the Great General showcasing her abilities by batting aside and smashing the projectiles with her hands and feet as if they were nothing.

"Is that all?" she asked before she unstrapped Basilisk from her belt and uncoiled the weapon, snapping it once like a whip before she ran at Esdeath.

A flash of black and she dropped to her knees when Tatsumi appeared right beside her, his spear flying by just inches above the tip of her nose. She leaped back up to her feet and grunted when Tatsumi continued his assault by ramming his fist deep into her gut, knocking all of the wind out of her lungs and pushing her back several feet towards the edge of the ravine.

"I've always dreamed of fighting you Esdeath, but this young man is making this so much better!" said Jacqueline as she wiped some saliva away from her lips and cracked her knuckles. "Maybe if this keeps going on like it is now, I might show you my Teigu."

"Isn't that blade your Teigu?" asked Tatsumi, Jacqueline giggling as she lifted up Basilisk and shook her head.

"No, not originally. I took it off that hunter and cut his arm off with it. To see my real Teigu...you'll have to entertain me a little while longer." she replied, Esdeath snarling out of anger for her old subordinate while Tatsumi was left baffled at the fact that she possessed two Teigu.

" _If she's as powerful as she says...could she actually be able to dual-wield Teigu?_ "

The fight began again when she slapped her palm to the ground and created several ice pillars that forced Jacqueline to leap into the air and ride it up high into the sky to avoid being pierced by one. Esdeath and Tatsumi followed her up and leaped from pillar to pillar, striking blades with the Great General left and right the higher they went.

"Hagelsprung!" yelled Esdeath while snapping her fingers, a massive hunk of ice materializing in the air directly above Tatsumi and Jacqueline.

He avoided Basilisk and took the opportunity to smash his foot into her gut again, Jacqueline flying back and striking the bottom face of the ice pillar like a bug on a window. When she heard Jacqueline hit the ice Esdeath kicked the pillar from above and sent it rocketing back down towards the earth, crushing the Great General underneath its immense weight.

"Nice one!" said Tatsumi after landing on the ground a few meters away from where the ice had hit the ground.

"So much for being the Great General." replied back Esdeath with a smirk, her expectations of her former subordinate instantly dropping.

That quickly changed when a huge crack emerged in the side of the ice pillar, several more lancing out from the original a few moments later until the entire structure broke apart into several individual pieces. Tatsumi and Esdeath got ready again for a fight when Jacqueline climbed out from the pile of ice and laughed again, her right arm hanging limp at her side.

"Now that's what I remember of the Empire's Strongest! Completely overwhelming and devastating power!" she said before she suddenly popped her shoulder back into place and rolled it around, the shoulder blade cracking at least seven times. "Now I'm entertained enough to show you my Teigu!"

"I really would like to see it, but we can't stay here any longer then we have to." said Esdeath while bringing up her rapier, Jacqueline giggling again.

"Aw, you're no fun." she replied before her smile dropped and a heavy scowl took over her face, her killer intent manifesting itself again in a dark shroud behind her. "I guess I'll just have to take you to the torture chambers and show you there…"

In a flash she was right on top of Esdeath and Tatsumi, her foot rocketing into Tatsumi's face and sending him flying over the ravine clear to the other side. He came crashing down onto the grass and had to quickly pick himself up when Jacqueline leaped over to him with her fists clenched. He deflected Basilisk with his spear and threw a fist at the Great General, Jacqueline seeing it coming and holding up a hand to catch it. Tatsumi's eyes shot wide open when she stopped it easily, as if the punch had come from an infant, and maneuvered around his fist to grab onto his wrist and sling him up into a nearby tree.

"To think you would be this weak...pitiful." she muttered with a dissatisfied tone, Tatsumi snarling and launching himself off the tree and catching her off guard with his speed.

"Don't fuck with me!" he bellowed as he gripped the shaft of Neuntote and brought it around in a wide arc, the spear plunging into Jacqueline's side and cutting through her midsection until coming out the other side, very nearly bisecting her.

Jacqueline stumbled back a few feet, clutching her gut in order to keep all of her internal organs from spilling out, and looked up at him with half-open eyes. "Now that's more like it…"

"Goodnight, Great General." growled Tatsumi as he balled up another fist and prepared to knock her off the edge and into the ravine a couple of feet behind her.

He was completely flabbergasted when, after throwing his first at her jaw, she raised up the hand not holding Basilisk and pushed aside his arm, her knee shooting straight up into his gut and knocking the wind out of him. He had a moment to glance at her abdomen and gasped when he saw the wound he had inflicted was no longer there, the skin possessing no marks or scars whatsoever.

"A measly cut like that won't kill me." she whispered into his ear before he pushed him back, rolled up her fingers tightly and rammed her fist deep into his gut again, the force enough to crack Tyrannus and cause a few bits and pieces to fall off.

As he dropped to his knees she sent her elbow into the side of his head and knocked him out cold, his body falling over and hitting the grass with a heavy thump. Now with Tatsumi incapacitated, it was just her and Esdeath now.

"Esdeath...I'm ready to play with you again." she giggled as she crossed the makeshift bridge of ice the former General had created earlier and stared at Esdeath.

"Why you little…"

When she tried to stab her with her rapier, Jacqueline blocked the blade with Basilisk, and when she tried to use an ice sword with her other hand she grabbed Esdeath's arm with her free hand and held it back. They stared at one another, the two seemingly matched in strength until Esdeath was caught off guard when Jacqueline smiled.

"You won't be needing that arm, right?" she asked, Esdeath's eyes widening before she felt something sharp pierce through her bicep and emerge out the other side.

Jacqueline let go with her fingers and whipped her arm up, the bone rod protruding from her palm slicing clean through the rest of Esdeath's bicep and completely severing it. She screamed and dropped to her knees, her other hand dropping the ice sword she had formed and moving to stop the bleeding from where her arm once was.

Jacqueline stared down at Esdeath with an insane smile on her face as she raised up the hand she used to cut off Esdeath's arm and licked the blood off the fingers, the sharpened bone shaft sliding back into her arm and vanishing from sight.

"Mmm...so that's what Demon's Extract tastes like…" she said after licking her lips, Esdeath glaring up at her and growling.

"Oh, don't look at me like that, Esdeath." she replied, the Ice Queen baring her teeth as she swung at her with her rapier again and forced her to leap back.

"Jacqueline!" bellowed Esdeath angrily as she sucked up the pain and assaulted Jacqueline, the two going at odds with one another in a series of blows that could easily shatter the bones of a normal human being.

"Even while injured, you still showcase such offensive power!" marveled Jacqueline in awe when she ducked under a kick from Esdeath to lunge at her.

She automatically formed an ice wall in order to stop her in her tracks, but Jacqueline merely laughed and broke through it with just her bare fist and very nearly stabbed her with the bone shaft that had emerged from the palm of her hand. When Esdeath stepped to the side and avoided the attack at the last second, Jacqueline slammed the palm of her other hand into her throat and lifted her up into the air, her strength surprising Esdeath. She could feel the Great General's fingers begin to tighten around her neck, making it harder and harder to breath for her with each passing second. She thrashed and kicked to try and free herself from Jacqueline's grasp, and when she had the idea to freeze her she was quickly discouraged from doing it when the grip around her throat tightened even more.

"I know you can freeze people just through skin touch, so don't even try it." stated Jacqueline blankly, Esdeath growling again.

"I enjoyed this fight, Esdeath, and I really did want to bring you back to my personal torture chamber to...catch up on old times, but...you're too dangerous to be kept alive." said Jacqueline with a smile as she extended her other arm out and dropped Basilisk, another bone sword emerging from her hand. "Goodbye, Esdeath. I'll make this quick."

She reared her arm back and was about to impale her through the abdomen before she felt a whoosh of air come from behind, her eyes widening when she felt something disappear. She looked back at her arm and was surprised to find that everything below her elbow had been cut off, blood squirting out of the severed arteries and veins like a damaged water pump.

"What?" she asked after looking back at Esdeath, the Ice Queen's lips curling up into a smile.

"Payback's a bitch, isn't it?" she asked before a red flash appeared between them both and in an instant, Jacqueline's other arm was cut off, freeing Esdeath from its grasp and allowing her to fall to her knees.

Jacqueline stumbled back and grunted, the loss of both of her arms meaning she couldn't use Basilisk any more, but before she could formulate a new strategy Tatsumi gave her a taste of her own medicine by ramming his clawed hand into her throat and squeezing tightly as he lifted her high up into the air, dropped her and smashed his right foot into her ribcage, easily breaking a few with the impact alone. She was thrown back right into the trunk of a nearby tree and cracked it in half, blood hurtling out of her mouth as she gasped at the amount of agonizing pain her body was encountered with all in the span of mere seconds.

Jacqueline coughed out more blood as she collapsed onto her knees, Tatsumi glaring at her while standing in front of the fallen Esdeath, who was rubbing her sore throat after nearly being choked to death.

"Seems you recovered quicker then I thought...oh well, it's not like I need arms to deal with you." wheezed Jacqueline as she picked herself up and inhaled deeply, Tatsumi cringing when he heard several loud pops and cracks come from her abdomen.

In a matter of seconds Jacqueline had already healed her broken ribcage and was glaring hard at Tatsumi, who gripped Neuntote tightly with both hands and lowered himself into a combat stance.

"Sorry to interrupt, but we're kinda on a schedule."

She whirled around at the new voice and was unable to react in time for Gazia, the voice's source, to strum his guitar and release a pressurized sound wave that caused every single artery in her body to burst. She gurgled as blood quickly filled her lungs and forced her to hack out some of it so she could breath properly, Gazia looking past her and motioning with his hand towards the direction Najenda and the others went.

"So I was right to come here after seeing all of that ice. Go, I'll wrap things up here. You need to get that arm healed." he said, Tatsumi nodding before he picked Esdeath up in his arms.

"Thanks Gazia, see you at Caern." he said, the guitarist watching him leap away with his wife to find Solomon and get her severed arm healed before she lost too much blood.

When they finally vanished, he looked back at the barely standing Jacqueline and changed the position of his fingers on Isterio when the Great General grinned at him and started to laugh.

"Amazing! So many powerful Teigu users, I'm simply ecstatic that I've been able to fight you all!" she exclaimed through the laughter, the guitarist comparing it to that of a madman.

"Your tenure ends today, Great General. Death God's Allemande." he said, his fingers strumming Isterio and creating a different sound wave that passed through Jacqueline and created a series of very loud cracking and snapping noises to echo out from her body, causing her to gasp again and fall down onto her back.

She was unable to move due to the attack breaking every single one of her bones and turning them into dust, and so the only thing that she was capable of doing was coughing and spitting out more blood as a result of her internal injuries. Gazia strode over to her and stood over top, the man lowering his guitar and reaching into his sleeve to retrieve a long dagger.

"I'm going to make you pay for every single person you killed at the Shisuikan. I lost a lot of good friends because of you." snarled Gazia, Jacqueline only smiling and looking into his eyes.

"Oh…? It was a lot of fun, you know, hearing them scream as I cut them to pieces…" she said, her second heart starting to beat at a faster pace then her normal heart inside her chest.

Gazia's eye twitched and he gripped the dagger in his hand even tighter, his own bloodlust showing itself due to the animosity he had towards the woman. Unfortunately he didn't look behind his left shoulder, or he would've seen one of Jacqueline's severed arms twitched slightly. The hand slowly opened up and began to create a bone fragment from itself, the sharpened tip aimed right at the guitarist.

"And just like them...I'm going to kill you too." she said, Gazia's eyes widened when she laughed.

He instinctively ducked down, luckily avoiding the bone shard when it was fired at the back of his head like a bullet. However, since he had lowered himself and got down closer to Jacqueline, she was able to arch her back towards him and rapidly extend her ribcage, the bones possessing razor sharp tips, out through her skin and dress and impale the man through his midsection.

Gazia coughed as if he had been punched in the gut and he spit up some blood, a couple of droplets falling from his mouth and out from behind his scarf onto Jacqueline's cheek.

"H-How did you…?" he stammered as he pulled himself off the bones protruding from her abdomen and stumbled back, Isterio falling from his grasp and hitting the grass with a thunk.

"This second heart of mine keeps me alive. Nothing can stop me as long as it continues to beat inside my chest." she said as she climbed back up onto her feet and looked at Gazia as if nothing he had done to her had happened in the first place.

Before Gazia could reply, Kahfka appeared right behind him and stabbed him through the back with her blade, spraying more of his blood across the grass in front of him and putting the final nail into his coffin.

"I'll kill anyone who hurts Jacqueline." she said viciously as he planted her foot against the back of his knees and kicked his legs out from under him.

Gazia collapsed onto the ground and Kahfka pulled the sword out from his back before she rolled him over and glared down at him, Jacqueline walking over and standing beside her with an insane smile on her face. She whispered something into Kahfka's ear and she nodded, the white haired woman bending down and planting a knee onto his chest while she removed his hat and scarf so they could see his face clearly when he died. Kahfka grasped Gazia by his throat and placed the tip of her blade up against the base of his neck, her shoulder muscles tightening.

" _Hehe...I guess this is what I get for killing all of those people..._ " he thought as he saw his entire life flash before his eyes in a matter of seconds, from the time when the Empire was corruption-free to now, where Prime Minister Honest had transformed it into a tyrannical regime.

" _I can't really complain...I've lived a long life. But...my day of retribution has come._ " he thought with a weak smile. " _I just wish I could've lived long enough so see the Empire return to what it should be. A nation ruled by just...and kind people. Tatsumi...promise me one thing...you better fucking beat this bitch._ "

Kahfka brought her arm back and with one, quick slice she severed Gazia's head from his shoulders and ended his life, the guitarist's body falling limp beneath her. She stood up and stepped back with Jacqueline, the Great General staring at him for a few more moments before she turned to face her subordinate, who just now remembered that she had no arms.

"Jacqueline, your arms! How are you-"

"Don't worry, Kahfka. Just give me a few minutes and they'll grow back, good as new. I just need you to hold onto Basilisk until then, okay?" said Jacqueline, Kahfka nodding and relaxing a little bit.

"Also...I couldn't catch up to the others. I'm sorry, Jacqueline." she said after picking up Basilisk and wrapping it up, Jacqueline looking at her as she turned to face her with a sorrowful expression on her face.

"I want to become stronger so that I can fight by your side, stronger then what I am now. Watching you stand up even after everything they did to you...I want to be like that."

Jacqueline couldn't help but smile, so instead of waiting for Devil's Heart to heal her arms without expending any energy, she poured some into the Teigu and quickly regenerated her arms so that she could wrap them around her and hug her lovingly.

"Okay...I'll happily help you accomplish your wish." she said, her smile becoming more malicious as she let go and looked back over her shoulder at something resting on the ground a few feet away. "And I know exactly how to do it…But, before I forget...let's send a little message, hm?"

 **\- Imperial City of Caern -**

 **\- One Hour Later -**

Tatsumi had managed to catch up to Najenda and the others a few miles out from Caern and as soon as he showed them Esdeath and the state she was in, Solomon immediately got to work on healing their injuries. In no time at all, Esdeath was resting up against a large boulder with Tatsumi at her side stretching and flexing her new arm after having it regrown.

"Now you know how it feels." said Najenda with a slight chuckle, the couple glaring at her from where they sat and causing her to nervously raise her hands up and grin. "Too soon?"

" _Way_ too soon." said Tatsumi before he returned his attention back to Esdeath and hugged her.

"So what's the plan when we get to Caern?" asked Chelsea, Leone leaning back against another rock and sighing.

"Yeah, what exactly are we going to do at a coastal village?"

"We're leaving the Empire behind." said Tatsumi in the utmost serious tone, all eyes falling on him.

"Wait, what?" asked Lubbock.

Tatsumi looked up from Esdeath, letting her rest her head on his shoulder, and glared at them all. "I don't know about any of you, but I'm leaving with Esdeath to the Eastern Nation, far away from the reach of the Empire and that Great General."

"But what about the Revolution and everyone that survived? You're just going to abandon them?" asked Mine, her anger starting to rise at his decision.

"No, we're not." spoke up Esdeath, her eyes opening as she let out a heavy sigh. "The reason why we're leaving is because we've just seen what Jacqueline is capable of, and with the Empire in total control of the Western Nations...its no longer safe to be here, especially with an unborn child."

Mine's expression softened when she remembered that Esdeath was pregnant, and after realizing that the baby's safety would be at extreme risk every time she would fight, her anger completely vanished. With that in mind, the Jaegers looked at their leaders and they came to the decision that if they were going to leave, they would too.

"We'll come with you guys. Can't let you go alone." said Wave with a smile, Tatsumi and Esdeath looking at the rest of the Jaegers and watching them nod their heads in agreement.

"If you really are going to leave...how long are planning on staying in the Eastern Nation?" asked Najenda, their gazes turning to her. "Because if you all are gone, we'll be the only ones that are capable of fighting Jacqueline on even ground, and even I doubt that if she was able to take both of you on at the same time."

"At least seven months." stated Esdeath, the air over them becoming tense.

"Jeez...that's a long time…" muttered Lubbock as he rubbed his temples and let out a sigh.

"I assure you, once the baby is born and we can find someone suitable-"

"And trustworthy." interrupted Esdeath, Tatsumi nodding before he continued.

"And trustworthy, we'll come right back and help you all with taking down the Empire. I promise." he finished, Najenda staring at him with narrowed eyes for a few seconds before she dropped her gaze and ran a hand through her hair.

"Okay...we'll try to hold on as long as we can."

Kurome, who had remained silent throughout the entire conversation, coughed lightly to get their attention. When she got it she moved over a little towards Akame and she said, "Actually, if it's okay with you, I'm going to stay here with my sister."

Tatsumi and Esdeath both nodded and Kurome scooted over a little closer to Akame, the two sisters now inseparable now thanks to the two groups coming together.

With that they ended their rest and travelled the rest of the way to the coastal town of Caern, a relatively large naval community that acted as a stopping point for the Imperial Navy from time to time. And thankfully, when they arrived there, they didn't have to worry about that since there were no Imperial Navy warships in sight. The one thing they had to worry about was discovering the location of Gazia, who said he would meet them there after dealing with Jacqueline...hopefully.

Little did they know, however, that his body had been sent back to the Imperial Capital where it was put on display for all to see. He was to act as a message to the survivors of the Revolutionary Army and the Path of Peace that no one is safe.

If you were suspected of being a conspirator, you would be killed regardless of your stature or position.

When the conclusion was made that Gazia must've perished at the hands of the Great General, somehow, they all shared a silent moment for their comrade before Najenda and Night Raid helped find a ship that would take them across the ocean to the Eastern Nation they had only heard stories about. Once they were on board, Tatsumi and Esdeath waved goodbye to them as the ship churned out of port on its way to their new home for seven months.

"Well, what do we do now?" asked Tatsumi as they turned away from the rail and began to walk towards the door leading into the ship's' interior, the location of the living quarters.

"Seeing how it's been a while since we truly relaxed…" started Esdeath before she smiled and grabbed Tatsumi's arm and pressed her breasts up against him. "How about tonight it's just you, me, and a bottle of wine?"

"That's music to my ears."


	21. To a New Land

A/N Yes, my fellow readers, we are now leaving the troubled lands of the Empire behind and traveling to the hardly talked about Eastern Nation that is separated by a vast ocean. You all probably can assume that I'm going to be completely making up everything there is about it, and you would all be right. This is a fanfiction, so of course I'm going to do that. Duh. Also after this chapter I will finally be making the page for Kahfka, Jacqueline's subordinate/lover, mainly the latter one, so you all can view her appearance. You will understand why I waited this long to do so upon reading this chapter, so when finished, hop on over to **FanficCollective** and search her up. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 20 -To a New Land**

The trip across the ocean had taken three weeks from their departure from Caern, but as the sun rose up over the horizon they finally arrived at the coastline of the Eastern Nation. The Jaegers lined up along the railing of the ship and took in the sight of the completely foreign land, the rolling green hills and the morning fog settled over the shores making it seem like something out of a fairy tail.

"So this is the Eastern Nation…" said Wave in awe of how beautiful it looked from where they were, Solomon crossing his arms and snorting.

"You think it looks cool now? Wait until you see the capital."

"You've been here before?" asked Run, Solomon quickly clearing his throat and rubbing the back of his neck.

"Uh, yeah. A long time ago."

"Well, a lot can change over the course of several years. It may look even better then what you remember it to be." stated Chelsea with a smile as the boat maneuvered around a rock formation and turned its bow towards a large industrial dock city on the coast.

Just from how ever many miles away they were, they could tell from the smoke-stacks rising up from the city that the Eastern Nation must be heavily industrialized, possibly even more so than the Empire. And if they did possess a bustling capital city like the Empire, their strength might also be the same as well.

The boat finally docked at the huge harbor the city possessed and the gangway was lowered down, the ship's passengers beginning to file down the narrow walkway one in an orderly fashion. Tatsumi and Esdeath led the Jaegers with them and upon reaching the concrete and stone harbor they made their way towards the city itself, wanting to see just what was so mysterious and unique about the Eastern Nation. They hardly ever heard anything about the nation separated by water, so being here was the perfect opportunity for them to learn more about the Empire's other neighbor besides the Western Nations, the Northern Tribes and the Southern lands.

The people here definitely dressed more casually then the citizens of the Imperial Capital, and they noticed that everyone here radiated an aura of happiness and optimism, which was a rare sight back home.

"This place is amazing…" uttered Tatsumi in awe of the sprawling cityscape around them and the excellently built structures.

"I want to see what the capital city looks like. Let's head there." said Esdeath as they delved deeper into the city in their search to find transportation to the capital city Solomon had mentioned earlier.

When they finally found transportation they came to another realization. The Eastern Nation was indeed more technologically advanced then the Empire, since their transportation was actually a vehicle that was steam-powered and could move on its own. And if just one vehicle was like that, they could assume that the rest of the city and the nation as a whole was a huge user of steam power.

Before they could step into the vehicle, however, Tatsumi felt a hand get placed on his shoulder and he looked back right into the face of a soldier dressed in a light grey military uniform with chest pockets, a matching visored field cap and a sword sheath dangling from a belt. Behind him stood at least five other soldiers, only they carried rifles over their shoulders alongside a sword.

"I can tell that you folks aren't from around here. You need help finding something?" he asked with a smile, Esdeath turning around and stepping up next to Tatsumi while shaking her head.

"No, we're fine. We were just on our way to the capital." she said, the soldier examining her face for a second before his eyes widened upon matching her with something he remembered seeing earlier.

The other Jaegers noticed the change in his expression and they prepared to use their weapons in case a fight broke out, but to their surprise the man laughed and ran a hand through his hair after removing his cap.

"Wait a minute, you're Esdeath, from the Empire. And all of you are the Jaegers, right? The people that turned rogue?" he said as he returned the cap to its original position.

When he looked at their expressions and saw the anxiety developing in them, he raised his hands up to show that he wasn't planning on arresting or even trying to fight them. "Relax, I'm not going to apprehend you or anything. All of us here aren't really huge fans of the Empire either."

"Really? Well that's the best thing I've heard in a long time…" muttered Wave with a sigh of relief as the soldier beckoned them to follow him and his companions.

"Here, I'll take you guys to the capital." he offered, Tatsumi glancing back at the others and shrugging before they followed him to another vehicle detailed with the marks of what they assumed to be the Eastern Nation's army while the rest of his comrades stayed behind.

It took them a couple of hours to drive from the coastal city through the sprawling countryside, but after cresting a small hill they were all treated to a wondrous and breath-taking sight before them. The road they were on was leading them straight to a massive wall constructed entirely out of white marble that encircled a city at least three times as large as the one they were previously at, around the same size if not larger then the Imperial Capital back in the Empire. There was a mixture of brick buildings mixed with larger factories that churned out white smoke from the stacks they sported, no doubt powered by steam generators, and rising up from one portion of the city was a large castle fortress.

The sight that took their breath away though was the massive volcano, they could tell by its structure, rising up behind the city high into the sky, and even from here they could just barely make out a switch-back style pathway carved out into the side of the volcano that led up to its caldera, which meant that there was a portion of the city located inside they had yet to lay eyes upon.

Decorating the massive gates that offered entrance to the city beyond the wall was a large crest with a shield possessing an eagle in the center, its wings outstretched, and three golden crowns situated above it. Directly above the crowns was a purple banner with some sort of creed or motto, and when he couldn't figure out what it meant, Tatsumi tapped the soldier who had offered the ride on the shoulder and pointed up to the banner.

"Hey, what does that mean?" he asked, the soldier squinting to see the words and grinning as he looked back at him.

"It's "Durch Wissen kommt Sieg", which stands for "Through Knowledge comes Victory". We pride ourselves on that saying because our nation's lasted pretty much just as long as your Empire thanks to us pursuing knowledge and such. That's why we have steam-powered vehicles and you guys still rely on horses."

"Hey, that hurts." said Wave, the soldier laughing.

"What about your military? You all are obviously part of the Eastern Nation's army, so are there any other branches?" asked Esdeath, her curiosity peaked.

"Yes, it does, and our name isn't the Eastern Nation." stated the soldier as they drew closer to the protective wall. "Our nation's name is the Kingdom of Straelka, ruled by the Kaiser and Kaiserin which was founded around one thousand years ago by the first Kaiser, Bismarak."

"Oh, sorry."

"It's fine, people from across the ocean get it wrong all the time. But anyways, yes, we do have other military branches. I'm a part of the Royal Army, and the other two branches are the Royal Navy and the most powerful is the Royal Air Suppression Forces, or the R.A.S.F for short."

"Royal Air Suppression Forces?" questioned Run. "What exactly do they do?"

The soldier pointed towards the sky with a grin and everybody raised their eyes upward, their jaws dropping when they spotted a massive metal airship flying overhead, its propulsion a series of propellers on either side of its hull. They watched it for a few more moments before they all heard an explosion off in the distance, the soldier whipping his head around and spotting the smoke from it over one of the hills to their right.

"And it seems that one is heading to help our boys out with another Danger Beast attack."

"Danger Beast? You guys have them too?" asked Tatsumi.

"Oh most definitely. This place, before Straelka got here, used to be crawling with the things. It used to be really mountainous around these parts too, but when the First Kaiser came here he used a Teigu given to him by the First Emperor of the Empire to pretty much turn the landscape into what it is today." replied the soldier, the Jaegers gasping at the mentioning of a weapon they thought was exclusive to the Empire and the surrounding lands alone.

"Wait, the first Kaiser used a Teigu? What was it?" asked Esdeath, the soldier shrugging.

"I dunno. The only thing I can remember about it is that its strongest attack is what allowed him to shape the very land itself."

Another explosion emerged in the distance followed by a large flash of light, the airship now halfway there. The soldier grinned as he looked back at them and asked, "Hey, what do you say about seeing our military in action? If we're lucky, we might be able to get a glimpse of the Princess too!"

"The Princess?" asked Solomon, his interest now shooting through the roof.

"Yeah, the daughter of the Kaiser and Kaiserin. She's the current wielder of Bismarak's Teigu, since it's only passed down through the Royal Family."

"I say we go, sounds pretty interesting!" exclaimed Wave, the soldier nodding as he turned the wheel of the vehicle sharply to the right and went off the cobblestone road, heading straight for the battle in the distance.

"Please keep your hands and feet inside the vehicle at all times, we'll be taking a little detour folks." joked the soldier with a light chuckle as he pressed his foot down on the accelerator pedal and picked up speed, the Jaegers holding on for dear life as they bounced and rocked over the slightly uneven terrain.

They reached the hill and he poured power power into the steam engine, the vehicle racing up the hill in a matter of seconds and passing over it. What they saw was like something straight out of a legend of fighting monsters or something along those lines. Columns of Straelka's soldiers were lined up behind trucks that had taken them there, firing off their rifles up at a massive hydra-like Danger Beast with at least ten heads, but their eyes were more focused on a lone figure that seemed to be _flying_ in between the beast's necks.

"Is that her? The Princess?" asked Solomon a little too eagerly, the others glancing at him with a raised eyebrow while the soldier nodded.

"Yep, that's the Princess alright. She's the strongest fighter in the Kingdom, so I don't think it was necessary to send out one of the airships to fight that thing." stated the soldier as he brought their car to a halt on top of the hill and leaned back in his chair.

Solomon watched the Princess carefully, the Jaegers seeing that there were wings on her back just like Mastema's that were allowing her to fly. She spun through the air past the gaping maw of one of the Hydra's heads and with a sword in her hand she cleaved through its neck, reducing the amount of heads it had by one. Everything seemed fine from there, but when Solomon noticed the freshly cut flesh begin to bubble and spasm, he knew that the Danger Beast was far from being killed.

"Shit, that thing's stronger then it looks!" he said before pointing at the wound, the skin suddenly bursting as another pair of necks emerged, each with a head at the end of it.

He knew that if the Hydra could grow its heads back like that, then it should be able to regenerate other portions of its body as well. That meant there was only one way to stop it, and that was to destroy its entire body and leave no trace behind.

"She's not gonna be able to kill that thing alone!" said Solomon with a growl before vaulting himself out of the back of the vehicle and sprinting towards the battlefield, the Jaegers and the soldier unable to stop him in time.

"Well, this should be interesting." mused Esdeath as she leaned up against Tatsumi to watch the show that would be coming in a few moments.

Solomon unsheathed his blood rapier from his belt and quickly cut a deep gash into his other hand, allowing him to create a large trident with his phoenix blood. When he got close enough he saw that three of the Hydra's heads were converging in on the Princess so he reared back and threw the trident as hard as he could. The Princess was about to bring up her shield to block the three heads when all of a sudden the blood red trident Solomon had thrown zoomed past her and struck one of the heads right in the eye, its blood spraying out and distracting it long enough for her to fly up higher.

She looked down and spotted the person who had created the trident run full speed right at the Danger Beast's chest, leap up and ram both of his feet into the center of its body, the impact creating a massive shockwave while pushing the Danger Beast back several hundred yards from the force alone.

To her shock he hunched over and the skin on his back split open to allow four massive tendrils of blood to emerge from his body and instantly double in size, easily rivaling the Hydra in size.

"I appreciate the assistance, but I didn't need help." she said with a grin as she flew down next to Solomon and flicked off the blood on her sword, the Jaeger laughing.

"Can't let you have all the fun." he replied before he leaped up into the air, the blood tendrils growing again and shooting out at the Hydra to pierce the Danger Beast through its chest and restricting its movement.

"Camilla, now!" he shouted, the Princess hesitating for a moment before she drew her arm back, light energy quickly manifesting around her sword and rapidly increasing its size and length.

She opened her eyes and when she finally gathered enough energy, she brought her arm straight up and increased the length of her sword so far that it stretched at least a mile up into the sky, the light it was giving off almost blinding everyone in the vicinity.

"Klinge des Lichts - Bergschneider!" she bellowed before swinging her arm straight down, the massive blade of light following suit and cleaving the Hydra clean into two separate halves.

Solomon took the opportunity to suck in a massive amount of air, his chest puffing up, and breathed out a massive stream of fire that consumed the Hydra's body and turned it into ash, taking away the possibility of it regenerating and effectively killing it.

"Wow, your guy is pretty strong." said the soldier sitting with the Jaegers atop the hill, Tatsumi grinning.

"Of course he is. And was that attack what I think it was?" he asked, the soldier nodding.

"Indeed it was, the fabled Mountain Cutter."

"And it's called that because…?" started Wave before the soldier pointed to the plateaus off in the distance.

"You see those plateaus over there? Those used to be mountains."

"Oh...I see."

Down below, now that the Danger Beast had been killed, the soldiers that had gathered there began to load up onto the trucks that had delivered them there and leave the area with the airship doing the same above. Solomon retracted his blood tentacles and rehealed the skin of his back while he put his rapier back in its sheath, a sigh escaping his lips before he felt a presence behind him.

"How did you know my name?" asked the Princess, Solomon slowly turning around and facing her with a cheeky grin on his face.

In that moment the Princess gasped. The grin, the face, the eyes and the style of hair he had all clicked together, a picture forming in her head. The sword and shield in her grasp fell through her fingers and clanged against the ground, tears of joy emerging from the corners of her eyes when she realized who it was standing before her.

"S-Solomon? Is that really you…?" she asked, Solomon chuckling as he ran a hand through his hair.

"Hi, Camilla. I-It's been a while, hasn't it?

The soldier from before decided to drive up with his vehicle with the rest of the Jaegers and came to a stop when he saw the two staring at each other, each with a blush on their faces. To their shock the Princess walked up to Solomon and threw her hands around him, hugging him tightly despite the armor she wore. He grunted when she pressed herself up against him, but he chuckled again and returned the hug, Esdeath, Tatsumi and others hopping out of the vehicle and smirking as they walked up to them.

"Uh, care to explain what's going on here? Anyone?" asked Wave with a dumbfounded expression on his face, the two drawing away from one another and Solomon clearing his throat.

"Um, yeah...Guys, this is Camilla Allegrie, the Princess of Straelka. She's an old...friend of mine." he said, Camilla smiling warmly as she waved at them.

"It's a pleasure to meet all of you." she said before she recognized Esdeath standing among them. "And I'm guessing all of you are the Jaegers we've been hearing so much about?"

"Yeah...we're kind of wanted by the Empire…" muttered Chelsea with a cheesy smile, Camilla waving aside the statement and putting a hand on her hip.

"It's fine. You can stay here for as long as you like, since we don't really care for the Empire. If you want, you can stay in the Royal Palace with me."

"Really?!" stammered Tatsumi, Camilla nodding.

After the rest of the Jaegers introduced themselves to Camilla, she led them back to the capital city, which they found was named Cinigraed, and acquired a way to get up to the volcano's caldera, where she said the upper-class and political figures live, alongside with being the location of the Royal Palace.

"So, you said that you were old friends. I don't think that's the whole story." said Chelsea with a mischievous grin as she looked up at Camilla and Solomon, who were riding on horses up ahead of them on the path leading to the top of the volcano.

"Well...how do I put it…" said Solomon, his eyes drifting off to the side while Camilla glancing over her shoulder back at them and grinning.

"He used to live here several years ago, and he was a member of the Royal Army as a Dragoon." she said, the Jaegers gasping while Solomon merely shrugged. "He was such a good soldier that he was selected by my father, the Kaiser, to join the Indigo Guard, the elite force that guards the Royal Family, and act as my personal body guard."

"Okay, I wasn't that good…" replied back Solomon with a laugh, Tatsumi having to blink a few times and see if what he heard had been correct.

"You used to live here? Why'd you leave?" he asked, Solomon's smile dropping as he sighed.

"I wanted to see the world, so I left the military and travelled to the Empire. To be honest, before I joined up with you guys, I was going to return after I fought Esdeath, but I got caught up with being in the Jaegers and I sort of forgot." he said, Camilla frowning and punching him in the arm...hard.

"You forgot?"

"Sorry! Jeez!" he exclaimed, Tatsumi and Esdeath glancing back at one another and smirking when they sensed that there was more to them then just being "friends".

After a few minutes they finally reached the end of the path and came to the caldera portion of the capital, which looked even more beautiful then what rested down below at the foot of the volcano. The buildings were elegantly crafted and resting in the center of the crater, protected by a wall made out of marble was the Royal Palace, a grandiose piece of architecture that rivaled the Imperial Palace in size and design. Camilla led them down from the road and into the city streets, her status as Princess meaning they were greeted left and right by the citizens and met with smiles all around.

"Come on, I'll take you guys to meet my parents. I think they would be interested in meeting the Jaegers." she said over her shoulder as they got onto a road leading directly to the gates of the wall surrounding the Royal Palace.

Upon reaching the gate they were stopped by men dressed in full-body armor that had a distinct purple color, Tatsumi guessing that they were members of the Indigo Guard Camilla had mentioned earlier. He looked at Solomon and he wondered if he had to wear that armor when he joined the elite division, but that thought was pushed aside for a later time when they were allowed past into the palace grounds.

"Wow...so beautiful…" uttered Chelsea as they walked through a massive garden with budding rose bushes, perfectly trimmed trees and fountains that gave off every signal that this place was managed by experts.

"Good morning Princess!" said an Indigo Guard member as they approached, Tatsumi taking note that the guards in the palace itself looked entirely different.

Instead of full-body armor they dressed in a more ceremonial uniform colored grey with an indigo-colored beret, the seal of the Royal Family stitched onto it, a matching indigo sash that stretched across their chest over their right shoulder, a black belt with a rapier hanging from it, and knee-high black boots.

"Good morning!" replied Camilla happily as she hopped off her horse, Solomon, Tatsumi, Esdeath and the others following suit so other Indigo Guard members could take them away.

The doors were opened to them and they walked into the white interior of the Royal Palace, its marble walls and floor shining brightly from the sun rays passing in through the windows of the entrance hall. Tapestries and golden chandeliers hung all around them as they got further and further into the palace, Camilla stopping by the armory the palace offered for the Indigo Guard to change out of her battle armor and instead slip on a grey keyhole sweater and pants, opting to walk around barefoot.

"This way." she said with the flip of her hand after walking out of the armory, the Jaegers following her into another portion of the palace and arriving a large set of oak wood doors.

She pushed them open and walked inside, the Jaegers becoming astounded at what the throne room looked like. There were a row of marble pillars lining either side of the door leading up to the other end of the expansive room, and the ceiling possessed several archways that between them held three golden chandeliers carrying at least thirty candles each. Windows dominated the left and right walls, allowing in sunlight when it was day, and leading up to where the thrones sat was a purple carpet.

Sitting in the two thrones were what Tatsumi guessed to be Camilla's parents, the Kaiser and Kaiserin. The Kaiser was an older man with greying hair and a beard, a golden crown resting on his head, and the Kaiserin was wearing a purple dress with a tiara and a smile on her face.

"Hi Dad, hi Mom, I'm back." said Camilla as she walked up to her parents, the Kaiser laughing as he stood up and walked down the steps built into the elevated platform his throne sat upon so he could hug his daughter.

"Welcome back, my beloved daughter." he said, his eyes rising up and noticing the Jaegers still standing near the door. "And I see you brought some guests."

"Yes, I did. These are the Jaegers, and that's Esdeath." said Camilla after stepping back from their hug and motioning for them to approach.

"Ah, the famous General Esdeath, or I should be saying former General if what I heard is correct." said the Kaiser as he held a hand out, Esdeath shaking it with a smile.

"It is true, all of us are wanted by the Empire for attempting to kill the Prime Minister."

"That man, I swear...he's a disgrace of a human being." muttered the Kaiserin when she walked up to them with her hands held behind her back.

"And let me guess, you came here to seek sanctuary from the Empire?" asked the Kaiser.

"Well, sort of." replied Tatsumi after crossing his arms and shifting his weight onto his right foot. "We came here because the Empire is currently in the midst of a revolution and...it's too dangerous for a baby to be born there."

The Kaiser raised an eyebrow and he looked from him to Esdeath, who blushed slightly and slipped her hand into Tatsumi's. He realized what she meant a second later and he chuckled while patting Tatsumi on the shoulder.

"Ah, of course. Well, since you are all friends of Camilla, you can stay here in the Royal Palace for as long as you wish."

They rejoiced at the thought of living the life of a royal, and too eager for their own good they all left the throne room to check out the spare rooms the palace offered while Solomon remained behind, Tatsumi and Esdeath being the last to leave after they thanked the Kaiser and Kaiserin for their hospitality. When they disappeared Camilla strode up to her father and tapped him lightly on the shoulder, the monarch turning towards her.

"That's not the only surprise." she said with a smile before she pointed at Solomon. "Do you recognize him?"

The Kaiser cocked his head to the right and stared at Solomon for a few moments, his mind racing to try and deduce the identity of the man standing a few feet from him, before finally it clicked and he gasped.

"Well I'll be! Solomon?"

"Greetings, Kaiser." replied Solomon with a curt bow, the monarch instead embracing him in his arms as if he were his own flesh and blood.

"So you've finally returned! My have you grown since the last time we met in this hall. I can remember when you first came here as a member of the Royal Army and left as a Captain within the Indigo Guard and my daughter's personal guard no less!" exclaimed the Kaiser after stepping away from Solomon, the Jaeger laughing when he too recalled that point in his life.

"Yeah, that was pretty life changing. But now I'm a Jaeger, and I have my own Teigu to prove it. I actually helped Camilla fight that Hydra Danger Beast outside the wall a few minutes ago, and she got a good look at it." he replied, the Kaiserin hugging him as a well after he finished speaking.

"Well it's so good to see you again, Solomon. How long are you planning on staying?"

"Yes, indeed. I'd like to know that as well because we still have your uniform hanging in the barracks." added on the Kaiser, Solomon shoving his hands into his pockets and shrugging.

"At least seven months at the most, to give Tatsumi and Esdeath enough time for the baby to be born. After that we're planning about heading back to the Empire so that we can finish what we started and overthrow the corrupt regime."

The Kaiser nodded and he motioned to his wife to return to their thrones so that they could sit down. "So what I heard _was_ true...very well. It's a shame that you won't be able to stay and resume your position."

"Maybe when everything is over and we've established a makeshift government that'll keep the Empire stabilized until it gets back on its feet, I'll come back." said Solomon, the Kaiser nodding.

"Well, you can be off Solomon. Camilla, you can do whatever you please as well."

"Okay mom, dad. I'll see you later." said Camilla with a smile before she grabbed Solomon by the hand and started to walk towards the exit with him in grasp. "And you, Solomon, are coming with me.

He rolled his eyes and sighed heavily as he was dragged out of the throne room by the Princess, her attitude the exactly like he had remembered it from the last time he saw her. After the oak doors closed behind them he was allowed to walk with his own two feet as they walked down a different hallway and out to the palace's extensive gardens.

"So what made you decide to get all of those tattoos?" asked Camilla now that she had a good look of him.

"Well that one on my back of the phoenix is because of my Teigu, Vile Blood Curse. The others I got over time the more I travelled across the Empire. And I'm guessing that we're playing twenty questions now?" asked Solomon with a glance at her, Camilla pushing back a lock of her red hair and grinning.

"I have a right to know because you've been gone for so long."

Solomon rolled his eyes and sighed. "Fine. But it's my turn to ask."

"Go ahead." she said as they walked past one of the many fountains the garden possessed.

"So I see you've gotten better at mastering your Teigu, but you know you never told me what it was called."

"Oh, right! Well, you know that shield that I carry?" she asked, Solomon nodding. "That's my Teigu. Its name is Holy Eight: Claíomh Solais, and with it I can grow those wings, like you saw earlier, and I can create swords made out of light that I can willingly control and manipulate to attack enemies."

"Now _that_ is cool." he replied, Camilla blushing at his compliment as they continued to walk.

For the rest of the evening the two talked about what had happened to them in the years they had been apart and shared a few laughs at some of the experiences. When Solomon got to the part about him fighting Esdeath and all of the injuries he sustained, she was amazed that he could have survived, but he shook off like it was nothing and said he was able to survive thanks to his Teigu.

They enjoyed each other's company just like they had when Solomon was still a member of the Indigo Guard, and quite frankly, they were glad that it was able to turn out like this for reasons they had yet to reveal to one another.

 **\- Capital District Building No. 23, Reconditioning Department -**

Jacqueline opened the letter she had received earlier when she had returned to the Imperial Capital after finalizing the leadership changes in the Western Nations to ensure there wouldn't be any threats coming from there and read its contents, her expression brightening and a malicious smile spreading across her lips.

"Oh…? So they went to the Eastern Nation? And Esdeath is pregnant…?" she asked herself before she set down the letter and laughed. "Kahfka, my love, change of plans. You're going to the Eastern Nation."

She swiveled the chair around and crossed her legs over, the smile still on her face as Kahfka turning around when her named was called.

In the three weeks that had passed since their fight with the fleeing Jaegers, her appearance had changed somewhat on the outside, but on the inside she was pretty much a completely different person. Jacqueline remembered when they had returned to the Imperial Capital carrying the dead body of that guitarist she had killed and dropped it off to be put on display and how she had taken Kahfka to an old friend of hers.

That day, the old Kahfka had died...and the new Kahfka standing before her was born.

 **\- Capital District Building No. 05, Scientific Research Department -**

 **\- Three Weeks Earlier -**

"Is it going to hurt?" asked Kahfka as she was strapped to an operating table by a man dressed in a lab coat and bifocals, Jacqueline standing off on the side with the Inquisitor right next to her.

"Don't worry, Miss Kahfka. I'll be putting you under, so you won't feel a thing. The Inquisitor can attest to that fact." replied the man, Kahfka turning her head and looking at the former assassin with a hopeful expression.

"Trust him. It's going to be okay." he replied with a small smile, Kahfka letting out a sigh of relief before she finally relaxed and allowed for the scientist to put her to sleep with a special gas.

The operation took two hours, but after it was over the scientist took off the bloodied gloves he was wearing and tossed them, his next action to call over Jacqueline so that she could see for herself what Kahfka had become. He stepped aside so the Great General could approach Kahfka, who was resting on the operating table with her back turned away from her and a hospital gown on.

"Kahfka? Is everything okay?" she asked, her subordinate and lover perking up and turning around with a smile on her face.

"I feel fine, great even!" she said happily, Jacqueline returning a smile of her own as she took in the new look of Kahfka's eyes.

Her right eye had been left untouched and remained green, but her left eye had been replaced by a computerized scope that was colored red and blue, and just like the Inquisitor, only not at such a great scale, she had some of her internal organs replaced with strength-enhancing machines that would enable her to fight longer without growing tired.

Now there was only one piece left, and Jacqueline had brought it with her alongside Gazia's corpse and Teigu, which had been returned to the Imperial Vaults for future use.

"There's one last thing I have that will enable you to become stronger, Kahfka." she said as she snapped her fingers, the scientist walking over with a rolling cart carrying a stasis tube.

Inside was none other then Esdeath's severed arm, the blood of Demon's Extract it contained still inside the limb. The scientist pressed a button and a tube attached to the cut off portion of the arm began to suck out every last drop of blood inside, the skin beginning to shrivel up like a raisin until it was completely dry. He removed the beaker from the drainage system of the stasis tube and swirled around the blood inside for a few seconds before he handed it to Kahfka.

"Bottoms up, Miss Kahfka."

"Wait, what? You want me to drink Esdeath's blood?!" she stammered, Jacqueline giggling at her hesitation.

"It most definitely is her blood, but you do realize why, right?" she asked, Kahfka slowly shaking her head. "Esdeath gained her ice manipulation abilities as a result of her Teigu, Demon's Extract. It took the form of a chalice of blood, and she ended up drinking the entire thing. As a result, the blood concentration was exceptionally powerful and potent inside of her."

"Which means that even with this small amount from an arm, its still incredibly strong, and if you drink it you'll also become a user of Demon's Extract and might even give Esdeath a run for her money." said the scientist with an evil smile, Kahfka's gaze returning to the beaker of blood and not looking away.

She could feel something, a dark aura or feeling, pulsating from within the blood. It was if it were _calling_ to her, telling her to drink it and gain power beyond her wildest dreams. After a few moments of silence she finally gave in to the temptation and grabbed the beaker from his hand, looking down at the dark red liquid for another second before she lifted it to her lips and drank it down until nothing remained.

She shivered slightly at the strange feeling of the blood dripping down her throat and she looked from Jacqueline to the scientist. "Well, that wasn't so bad."

Suddenly every single one of the joints in her hand tightened all at once and she shattered the beaker with her bare hand, the glass shards flying everywhere while her hands flew to the side of her head. Her eyes shot wide open and her entire body started to shake vigorously, Jacqueline immediately becoming worried for her wellbeing when she started to hyperventilate. There were so many voices whispering and shouting and laughing maniacally in her head, so many that she could feel her sanity start to slip away.

" _Break. Kill. Murder. Perish. Erase. Death. Harm. Slaughter. Butcher. Execute._ " they chanted inside her head, the vile words being spoken by the voices starting to become unbearable.

"Kahfka!" cried out Jacqueline when she fell off the table and curled up into a ball, tears starting to pour down her cheeks.

The Inquisitor sprinted over and kneeled down beside Jacqueline as they looked over Kahfka, the young woman's psyche continuing to be assaulted and torn apart by the voices in her head. She was able to look up for a quick second and saw the look of her lover's face and instantly, something inside of her changed. Slowly she began to fight back against the voices, her will starting to conquer Demon's Extract's will until finally she was able to subjugate the Teigu and finally coming together.

She stopped crying and Jacqueline stood back up, the Inquisitor helping Kahfka to her feet and wiping the tears from her eyes and cheek for her while she regained her breath. After getting her breathing back under control, she looked at Jacqueline and smiled softly, the Great General letting out a sigh of relief.

"So...do you feel different?" asked the scientist when he deduced that the situation was under control.

Kahfka nodded to the Inquisitor and he let go of her, stepping back and putting his hands behind his back while she lifted up her left hand and flexed her fingers. She closed her eyes and could feel the power of Demon's Extract flowing through her, and after a few moments she clenched her fist. In the air next to her head a decently sized shard of ice colored pinkish red manifested from nothing and floated beside her, Kahfka opening her eyes again and grinning as the tattoo that marks the wielder of Demon's Extract formed at the base of her neck.

"I feel _more_ then different."

 **\- Present Day -**

And now, as a result of her interior transformation, she also changed externally too in the form of her style of dress. Now she wore highly revealing clothing reminiscent of metalli skin that included a unique tube top, arm warmers, a matching bottom pierce and leggings that also acted as her shoes. And hovering over her left ear was a metal disk-like object that acted as a communication device, giving her an overall look of a cyborg.

"I'll leave immediately then?" asked Kahfka, Jacqueline getting up and walking over to her.

"Yes, but when you get there, don't attack them. Just watch them and send a report back to me at the end of every week. I already have an ally there as well, so you'll have a place to stay." she said, Kahfka nodding before she started to walk towards the metal door of the Great Generals' personal torture chamber.

She didn't get far, however, when Jacqueline grabbed her hand and pulled her back right into a passionate kiss, Kahfka's cheeks lighting up as red as a tomato. She pulled away and Jacqueline said with a husky tone, "You _can_ leave, but not before I say my goodbyes."


	22. Welcome to the World, Little One

A/N And so the Jaegers have officially retired from the fight for a while to allow Esdeath and Tatsumi the time they need for their child. I bet you guys can already assume what's going to happen in this chapter just from the title alone huh? Yeah, I don't care, I couldn't think of anything else for the name so there it is. Deal with it. And just like I stated in the previous chapter, Kahfka's bio is up on the wiki, **FanficCollective**. Also, the Princess of Straelka herself has decided to bless the wiki with her presence. That's right, **Camilla Allegrie** is now on the wiki, as well as her Teigu, **Holy Eight: Claíomh Solais** , and the **Kingdom of Straelka,** so search them up and take in their awesomeness, courtesy of myself. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 21 - Welcome to the World, Little One**

 **\- Cinigraed Central Hospital -**

 **\- Seven Months Later -**

Tatsumi was sitting with his arms crossed and his eyes closed within one of Cinigraed's hospital's many hallways, his right foot tapping the ground over and over again out of anxiety at the situation. Outside in the entrance and meeting room were the rest of the Jaegers and Camilla, who had come with him when he had brought Esdeath here in a hurry after finding out that the baby was on it way.

After she was quickly admitted he was told to wait just outside the room she was in, and so that's where he's sat for however long its been. He lost track of time since the only thing he was worried about was his wife and their child, so it felt like it's been hours and that it would take another eternity.

Finally though the door a few feet away from him opened up and a doctor stepped out, the mask he was wearing hanging around his neck. He looked over at Tatsumi and he smiled, the man motioning to the interior of the room behind him with his thumb.

"It's done. Come on in sir." he said, Tatsumi shooting up out of his chair and walking past the doctor at a brisk pace.

What he came to was a sight that almost brought a tear to his eye. Esdeath was lying down in a hospital bed with her back and head resting up against a pillow with a smile on her face and something wrapped in a light pink blanket sitting in her arms.

She noticed him enter and she beckoned him over, Tatsumi approaching the bed and kneeling down beside her to take in the newborn baby that was inside the blanket.

"You were right…it was a girl." said Esdeath in almost a whisper, Tatsumi unable to speak or say anything right now as he looked at his daughter and the tranquil look on her face.

It wasn't a dream, everything happening right now was absolutely real. He still couldn't believe however that this child, this human being, was his daughter...his own flesh and blood, honest to god, daughter.

"C-Can I hold her?" he asked with a slight stutter, Esdeath nodding as she leaned to her right and extended her arms out, Tatsumi carefully putting his around their daughter and lifting her up.

She was a little heavy, but that was perfectly normal for a baby just born, and he stared down at her face once again and the peaceful expression it had. He reached up with a hand and gently poked her in the nose, his smile widening when it shriveled up and she shifted slightly.

"Welcome to the world, little one." he whispered before he handed her back to Esdeath and pulled up a chair next to her. "You remember what I said we should name her, right?"

"Of course I do...my little Lucena…" replied Esdeath as she stroked their daughter's cheek while Tatsumi rested a hand on her head.

Around twenty minutes later the Jaegers plus Camilla turned towards the doors that Tatsumi had disappeared behind earlier when they were pushed open, everyone there instantly getting up out of their seats when the couple themselves walked out with Lucena in Esdeath's arms.

"Congratulations you two." said Wave as he clapped a few times while Chelsea ran up to them and tried to catch a glimpse of Lucena.

"Can I see her?" she asked, Esdeath lowering her arms so that way she could get a clear look of her.

While she and Camilla were absorbed in cooing over how cute Lucena looked and all, Tatsumi strolled over to where the other male members of the Jaegers stood and grinned at his wife and how happy she looked.

"So you're a father now…" said Run as he clapped a hand on his shoulder and looked at Tatsumi. "Feels weird, huh?"

"A little bit, but...now, I have another reason why I need to fight to take down the Prime Minister. I want her to grow up in a world where she won't have to worry about war or anything like that."

"I would do the same thing, man." said Wave with a nod before they all walked over to Esdeath to partake in looking upon Lucena.

When they all got their fill of her they made their way back to the Royal Palace to rest for the remainder of the day and to get themselves ready for when they had to go back to the Empire and see if Najenda and the others are doing okay. During the seven months they had been here in the Kingdom of Straelka they had been able to actually relax and not worry too much about being killed, but they still couldn't stop themselves from thinking about home and wondering what could possibly be going on over there.

To keep everyone from getting too worried though, they kept it to themselves.

While Tatsumi and Esdeath went to their room in the palace to spend some time alone with their newborn daughter and the other Jaegers decided to do the same, Solomon was walking through the palace gardens with Camilla again, something he's turned into a habit of his to do.

"So...I guess you'll be going back soon, right?" she asked, Solomon nodding his head after putting his hands in his pockets.

"Yeah. Once Esdeath and Tatsumi find someone they can trust to look after Lucena, we'll be returning to the Empire."

He looked down at her and he felt his heart tighten up a little when he saw the look of sadness on her face, so he put an arm around her and brought her in close. She gasped and her gaze locked onto his and the smile he had on his face.

"Don't worry, I'm going to come back."

"Really?" she asked.

"Yeah, I've decided. When the Prime Minister is dead and the revolution ends, I'll come back. Okay?"

She nodded vigorously and he laughed, the pair walking back into the palace to go to her parents and tell them of his decision to come back. They made their way towards the throne room and upon reaching the closed doors, Solomon spotted something out of the ordinary and stopped Camilla.

"What's wrong?" she asked, Solomon saying nothing as he approached the doors and extended a hand out towards a black, tar-like substance coating a small portion of one of the doors.

He wiped some of it off with his index and middle finger and rubbed it around a little, the liquid making a squishing noise when he opened and closed them.

"What the hell is this stuff…?" he muttered under his breath as he wiped it on the ground and stood back up, Camilla watching in silence as he put a hand up against the door.

"Stay here." he said over his shoulder before he pushed open the door, stepped inside...and came face-to-face with a nightmare.

Every single muscle in his body locked up and rooted him to the spot, the door behind him creaking as it remaining halfway open, luckily blocking the view of what laid inside from Camilla's gaze.

"Solomon? Are you okay?"

"D-Don't come in here…" he murmured over his shoulder, but his words came too late and before he could do anything to stop her, Camilla pushed aside the door and bore witness to the horrifying scene inside the throne room.

The black ooze was everywhere, the walls, the floor, even the ceiling...but this wasn't the terrifying part. What caused Camilla to drop to her knees, her face devoid of any other emotion except horror and shock, was that the thrones her parents would've been sitting in were thrown to either side of the room and on the ground, in a puddle of blood and black ooze, were her parents. They each had a gaping hole pierced through their chests right where their hearts would've been, which meant that whatever had produced the black ooze was the one who murdered them.

Solomon was left speechless, the shock overwhelming, but he looked down at Camilla and instantly the feeling of despair doubled when her shoulders started to shake and tears started to fall down her cheeks.

"M-Mama…? P-Papa…? she croaked, her voice even quieter then a whisper.

Her heart was in pieces, the sight of her parents dead acting like a hammer that obliterated it and reduced her to an empty shell of her former self that was only capable of being filled with sorrow and despair. Slowly, her lower lip started to quiver and Solomon braced himself for what was about to come in the next second.

Everyone in the Royal Palace, the Jaegers and any Indigo Guard members stationed in the building, heard the scream echo and bounce off every single wall and object. Tatsumi and Esdeath were the first to arrive at the throne room, the former ramming his shoulder into the still closed second door and leading the way inside for Esdeath and everyone else, only to stop dead in their tracks in disbelief.

"My god…" uttered Run before he turned away, forcing himself to not throw up at the scene before him.

Camilla had broken down, her tears miniature waterfalls now as she cried even harder. To try and comfort her, Solomon had kneeled down beside her and wrapped both of his arms around her, even though he knew that it was futile. The Indigo Guard finally arrived and the commanding officer among the group sent one running back to contact the only other person they could think of.

"Send word to the Lord Commander, immediately! The Kaiser and Kaiserin have been murdered!"

 **\- Outskirts of Cinigraed -**

 **\- Two Hours Later -**

Word of the Kaiser and Kaiserin's death was quickly spread throughout the Kingdom of Straelka, and everyone from all the cities that were apart of the nation made the journey regardless of what they were doing at that moment to the capital city where, just outside the protective wall, a funeral procession for their beloved leaders would be held.

The plains were covered by the immense crowd of people that showed up, and they either sat or stood up as rain clouds began to gather overhead as if the heavens themselves were crying. The Kaiser and Kaiserin had been exceptional leaders and cared for the populace throughout history, ever since the founding of Straelka by the first Kaiser. The people loved their leaders just as much as their own family members, and once they discovered that they were dead...they stopped everything to go and pay their final respects.

Standing at the front closest to the two elegantly crafted caskets that held the bodies of the Kaiser and Kaiserin were Camilla and Solomon, who still had his arm around Camilla that acted as a protective barrier to world around her. Behind them stood Tatsumi and Esdeath, with Lucena bundled up in her arms, Wave, Run and Chelsea.

Camilla lifted her head when a man with greying hair and body armor with a cape around his right shoulder walked up to her, a sorrowful look on his face.

"Hello, Camilla, Solomon." he said with a nod, the Jaeger returning the gesture.

"Lord Commander Wilhelm, sir." he replied, the man smiling before he looked back at Camilla and held his arms out.

"Come here, my child."

Camilla whimpered and Solomon let go of her so she could walk into the loving embrace of her Godfather, the Lord Commander basically family to her since he had always been there for her when she needed help. She softly cried into his shoulder and he rubbed her back, Solomon watching in silence when tiny raindrops began to come down from the clouds above.

She shuddered after a few minutes and stepped back from Wilhem, Camilla wiping the tears away and smiling at him before she returned to Solomon's side and looked up at her parent's casket when the priest who would conduct the funeral finally arrived. The words he said were far and distant, the Princess hardly listening to them.

When he finally finished, she and Solomon were the first the be allowed to walk up to the caskets, a picture of the Kaiser and Kaiserin alongside their names and bouquets of flowers resting behind them, and say their final goodbyes.

Camilla couldn't even speak a word when she saw the smiling faces of her parents looking back at her, so Solomon allowed her to look away and bury her face into his shoulder while he stared at their faces with a hard gaze.

" _Kaiser Alestrai, Kaiserin Venice...I swear on my life that I'll protect your daughter until the end of time, and that I will avenge your deaths. Before I leave...I will find the person who murdered you and end their life...so help me God._ " he thought before he took Camilla away, the two leaving the funeral on their own without saying anything else.

They didn't want to be around death any longer.

 **\- Royal Palace, Camilla's Room -**

Solomon opened the door and walked inside with Camilla still attached to him, the Jaeger chuckling lightly as he went over to her bed and motioned for her to let go. She shook her head and finally removed her face from his shoulder, the fresh tears she had shed as they travelled back to the palace finally dried and gone.

"Please...don't go…"

Solomon opened his mouth to reply, but he closed it and nodded, his next action being to sit down on the edge of the bed with her and put an arm around her while she remained glued to his side, her body shuddering again. He couldn't blame her, she had just witnessed her parents, the two people who had loved and cared for her more than anyone else for her entire life, dead and on the ground.

He waited for a few minutes for her to calm down some more before he took her hand into his own and squeezed it, the Princess looking up at him. "Camilla, hear me when I say this...I promise that I'll find the person who murdered your parents and kill them as retribution."

He met her gaze and he smiled, Camilla staring into his eyes and after seeing the determination in them, her lips curled up into one as well and she nodded.

"Solomon...I...I have a confession to make…" she said quietly, the Jaeger raising an eyebrow and waiting for her to continue.

"Um...when I first met you, when you became my personal guard, I…"

Solomon stared at her and could already guess, from the expression on her face and how she had always acted around him both before he left and now, what she wanted to say. He had always known about her feelings for him, and truthfully he felt the same way about her. She was beautiful _and_ the Princess, who wouldn't? But he was honor-bound as a Captain of the Indigo Guard to follow the oath he had taken to protect her at all costs. Falling in love was something that could endanger her, so he had barred himself from revealing his feelings for her.

But now...watching her struggle to tell him how she felt, and seeing now that the situation has changed, there was only one thing he could do now.

"I.." stuttered Camilla before she blushed and growled a little at herself. "God, I'm making myself sound like an idiot…"

She took a deep breath and regained her composure, looking at Solomon as he waited silently for her to speak her mind. "Solomon, your the best friend and guardian I can ever ask for as a Princess. But, as myself...I-I think of you as more then that. I-I like you."

"Well, um…" started Solomon as he chuckled and ran a hand through his hair.

"What's so funny?"

"It's funny because, um, I feel the same way…" he replied, Camilla's cheeks reddening even more while Solomon continued to laugh.

"Really? You mean it?" she asked, Solomon's laughter stopping when he nod his head.

"Yep. Truthfully, when I saw you fighting that Danger Beast and up close afterwards, my heart leapt out of my chest." he said, Camilla lowering her gaze and giggling softly. "Which is why, when the revolution in the Empire is done...I want to marry you."

This was what caused Camilla's eyes to widen in disbelief, the statement alone making her question if what she had heard had actually been what she thought she heard. As if silently asking him with the look on her face, Solomon answered her by nodding once with a smile on his face, and when she realized that it all indeed wasn't a dream, the feeling in her heart bloomed for the first time since when she saw him.

"Solomon…" she uttered, the two leaning closer and closer until their lips met.

A warm and fuzzy feeling arose inside of them both as they kissed, their love for one another finally allowed to show itself after so many years of being suppressed. Camilla ended up letting go of Solomon's arm and the fingers of their right hands intertwined, their hearts beating as one.

When they managed to pull away from one another, Solomon opened his eyes at the same time Camilla did and he grinned. "Well, that was certainly interesting."

Camilla giggled again and she rested her hands in her lap after removing hers from his right hand, her eyes looking from him to the ground. They sat there silently for another few minutes before she lowered herself down onto the sheets and rolled over onto her back, Solomon glancing down at her with a confused expression.

"Um, Solomon...do you, y'know...want to do it with me?" she asked, Solomon's cheeks becoming bright red when she offered him the opportunity to have sex with her.

He definitely wasn't denying the idea, but at the same time this wasn't the proper time for it, not yet anyways. So instead of just blatantly saying no, he chuckled and leaned back on his hands while staring up at the ceiling.

"I appreciate the gesture, but...now's not the right time. I love you, and you're beautiful, but...what you're saying is special, something that I'd rather wait to do until the time is right. If I did this right now, I would feel guilty by not doing everything in my power to avenge your parents first and foremost, and I would never be able to live with myself." he replied, Camilla looking at him and smilingly softly after he finished.'

She reached down and placed her hand on top of his while closing her eyes, Solomon's gaze returning from the ceiling back to her. She nodded to show her approval and he stood up, walking towards the exit to her room so he could return to his to prepare himself for the next day when he would get to work in trying to figure out the culprit behind the deaths of Camilla's parents.

 **\- Southern Lands of the Empire -**

As night descended upon the Empire and the moon began its ascent into the sky, a pitch black figure watched with a single red eye an army comprised of Imperial soldiers pass through a fairly large canyon towards the location of what they believed to be the location of the Revolutionary Army's secret base. The Empire had been furiously trying to discover its location so as to finally stamp out the revolution once and for all, but due to some sort of unknown force they had been unsuccessful so far.

That unknown force was the black figure staring down onto them from one of the canyon's cliffs above. The figure growled as its red eyes blinked a few times, the pitch black armor it wore absorbing any and all light that was cast upon it and rendering it virtually invisible in the dark.

A second person, at least two feet taller then the black armored figure and dressed in a long white trench coat with a hefty-looking longsword cast over its shoulder, walked up beside the first figure and chuckled.

"Are you ready, Magress?" it asked, the armored figure saying nothing as he held an arm out and manifested a large lance in its grasp, its length almost the same as the figure itself.

"Let's begin."


	23. Corruption

A/N I just love it when I start a chapter off so happy-go-lucky, then I take a burning hot stake, drive into your heart, twist it around a little bit and then pull it out through your back while laughing like the maniacal soulless bastard I am. Ah...does the heart good. But seriously though, that would be horrible if you found your parents dead before you, and If it had been me I probably would've done the exact same thing Camilla did. Anyways, this story is turning out to be my favorite I've ever written, and that's saying something since I love my Ace Combat series. I guess there will be a special place in my heart for this one.

And uh, no reviews on the last chapter huh. This is all I have to say about that. *Deep Breath*. God DAYUM you people, with nothing to say about the miracle of childbirth? From the main characters no less? AND Camilla's parents were murdered? And all I hear from you guys is *chirp, *chirp, *chirp. You people are heartless. But I digress, back to the story my friends. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 22 - Corruption**

"So what you're saying is that you want to do this on your own?" asked Tatsumi, Solomon and Camilla just finishing up telling him and the other Jaegers about their plan to discover the person behind the deaths of the Kaiser and Kaiserin on their own.

"Yes. What happened to her parents is horrible, and I swore that I wouldn't leave until I avenged them and killed their murderer." said Solomon with a nod, Tatsumi glancing over at Esdeath and waiting for her input on the situation.

They were the only two, alongside Wave and Run, who were interested in the topic at hand since Chelsea was busy playing with Lucena in her arms, the baby grabbing at her fingers when she would tickle her nose with them and laughing.

"I don't see anything wrong with this. Lucena was born yesterday, and I'd say we shouldn't have to be back until at least a week has gone by." she said after thinking about their proposition for a few seconds before sighing. "I guess what I'm trying to say is go for it. Find the person who did this and make him, or her, pay or it."

She looked over at Tatsumi when she put emphasis on _her_ , definitely implying a certain Great General that they hadn't met in a while, and he grimaced while Solomon did a mini fist-pump and stood up from his chair. Camilla followed him out of the palace common room and once the doors closed shut behind, they immediately began to head for the throne room, which had been kept off limits to anyone.

Anyone except for them, that is.

"So, what's our first move?" asked Camilla when they arrived at the throne room, Solomon silently thanking god when he saw that the black ooze he had seen the day before was still coating the door on the right.

"First, we're going to figure out just what the hell this stuff is." he said as he pulled out a flask he had grabbed from the palace kitchen and scraped some of the gunk off with his hand to pour into the container. "Is there anyone here that could identify this for us? Finding out what this stuff is will enable us to figure out who...or what, killed your parents."

Camilla held a finger to her lip and tapped it a few times before she had a eureka moment, the person they were looking for popping into her head. "I know who. We can go to the Royal Scientist! He's the smartest guy in the entire kingdom, possibly even the world. He's what's enabled us to have such advanced technology, so I doubt he won't be able to figure out what that stuff is."

"Perfect. Let's go meet him." said Solomon with a grin as he jogged away from the doors with Camilla leading the way.

He ended up leaving the palace with her and she took them through the caldera portion of the capital city towards a large observatory-like building built on the very edge of the volcano, and he guessed that was where this scientist guy lived. Upon arriving at the observatory Camilla stopped a few feet away from the door and looked back at Solomon, a concerned look on her face.

"Before we go in, I have to tell you something about this guy." she said, Solomon blinking a few times at the unexpected comment before he nodded.

"He...he's not really an open kind of person. Quite frankly, he hardly ever leaves this place. He's always absorbed in his experiments and such, so, when we go inside...just let me do the talking, okay?"

"Sure thing." he said back, Camilla's smile returning as she turned back towards the door allowing them entry and pushed it inward, the two walking inside to a complete other world.

The observatory looked relatively normal on the outside, but inside...the walls were covered in machines and equipment that one could find inside a mad scientist's laboratory. Actually, upon closer inspection, they found out it _was_ a laboratory since situated on various tables circling the perimeter of the observatory's floor were beakers filled with all sorts of unknown liquids of different colors.

They didn't have to search long for the scientist himself since not even a minute after they entered he appeared from the second floor, walking down a flight of stairs built into the wall of the room. He was preoccupied with a clipboard in his hand, dutifully writing something down and mumbling to himself about some sort of chemical composition or whatever. When he got closer Solomon got a good look at what the man was wearing, which he could immediately describe as something dating back to the first days of the Empire. He was draped in a dark purple cloak with a hood pulled up and over his head, a dark maroon long-sleeved undershirt, black gloves, and covering the entirety of his face was a maroon plague doctor mask with the traditional beak-like shape.

He hardly noticed them as he turned away from the stairs and approached one of the many lab tables, setting down the clipboard and picking up a steaming beaker with an orange liquid inside to swirl it around and observe its contents. Camilla glanced back at Solomon as if to say "See? I told you so." before she walked towards the scientist and held her hands behind her back patiently.

Once the man set down the beaker she cleared her throat and ask, "Um, Doctor?"

The man visibly stiffened up and turned around, Solomon seeing that his eyes were small, green irises with slit pupils floating in the black abyss of each eyehole for the mask. However, despite his scary appearance, the man laughed and held his arms out to Camilla as if she were his long lost cousin.

"Ah, Princess! What a pleasant surprise!" he said with a laugh after embracing Camilla, Solomon assuming they had a friendly relationship. "It's been such a long time since you last visited me!"

"Yeah, I know. Sorry, I'll try to do better." said Camilla with a cheesy smile.

The doctor finally took notice of Solomon and he crossed his arms, the Jaeger noticing his eyes narrow a fraction of an inch in slight suspicion. "Ah, and I see you have a friend. Care to introduce him?"

"My name's Solomon, and I actually used to be a Captain in the Indigo Guard and Camilla's personal guard before leaving several years ago." said Solomon as he extended a hand out to the doctor, the masked man shaking it.

"A pleasure to meet you, Solomon." he replied before his focus returned to Camilla. "So, what is it that has brought you to my laboratory today, young Princess?"

Camilla pulled out the flask of black liquid they had gotten from the palace throne room doors and held it up, the doctor looking at it for a few seconds. She handed it over to him and the man opened the cap, taking a whiff of the liquid inside and pouring a small drop of it out into his hand.

"What is this?" he asked, both Camilla and Solomon shrugging.

"That's why we came to see you. We have no idea what this stuff is, but we think that it has something to do with the death of my parents." said Camilla as they followed the doctor over to another table with other equipment on it, one being a microscope.

"How so?" he asked.

"This stuff was everywhere inside the throne room and it covered one of the doors as well." informed Solomon, the doctor nodding as he poured the contents of the flask onto a petri dish and placed it under the scope.

He used the knobs on side to adjust the scope until the view through the objective lenses was clean and crisp, and when he put his eyes up to the eyepiece...he was astounded by what he saw.

"This...this is incredible."

"What is it?" asked Camilla, the doctor changing the lense to a higher power to double check if what he was seeing was actually real.

"This liquid, whatever it is...it's alive."

"What?!"

"Look for yourself."

The doctor stepped aside to allow them to take a peek at the black goop, with Camilla being the first, and when she looked through the eyepiece she gasped. After getting her fill Solomon took her spot and after his eyes adjusted a chill ran up and down his spine. Just like the doctor had said, the black liquid was actually moving, however it was so minuscule that it couldn't be seen by the naked eye and that to truly grasp its nature they needed a device such as a microscope.

He was horrified by the liquid but mesmerized by it at the same time. Just what kind of stuff was this?

"What can you make from it?" he asked after pulling away from the microscope and returning to Camilla's side.

"It's definitely something organic, that much I can tell, but to fully get an understanding of it I'm going to need more time to analyze it." said the doctor as he rubbed his hands together, Solomon eyeing them carefully when he looked away. "I'll tell you what, I'll inform you both when I make a breakthrough. Until then, try searching north of the capital in the Golvorg Caverns. I've heard stories of Danger Beasts that live there with the unique ability to liquefy their bodies, so you may find your answer there."

"Okay, thanks. We'll be sure to do that." replied back Solomon before Camilla could respond, the doctor nodding before he turned away and started walking back towards the stairwell.

Solomon grabbed Camilla by the arm and led her out of the observatory much to her discomfort, the Jaeger refraining from speaking of explaining his actions until they were back outside and protected from behind overhead by the thick walls and doors.

"What was that for? That kind of hurt, you know." said Camilla with a pout as she rubbed her arm, Solomon rolling his eyes before he crossed his arms and glared up the observatory at where the second floor would be.

"I don't trust him." he replied, his fists clenching up.

"Why?"

"I don't know, it's just...something feels _off_ about him. I could barely smell it, but there was an aroma coming from that second floor that was unmistakable to me. It was the smell of rotting corpses, I'm sure of it."

He could see that Camilla was still doubting his suspicions of the scientist, so he waved it aside and got rid of the frown on his face.

"Okay, I'll keep my own opinions to myself. How about we go check out those caves the guy mentioned, okay?"

Camilla nodded and they left the observatory together to try and find a way to get to the Golvorg Caverns before it could get too dark to where they would have to wait, since at night the Danger Beasts in Straelka get more aggressive.

They didn't notice however a pair of eyes observing them from afar, and when they got too far out of range they vanished alongside their user as they repositioned to keep up with the pair.

They were able to find a willing soldier to drive them out from the capital north towards their destination, and thankfully they managed to get within hiking distance of the caverns before nightfall, so they told the soldier to wait for them while they investigated the area and told him they would be back soon.

"This place creeps me the hell out…"murmured Camilla as she gripped her sword tightly while keeping Claíomh Solais close at hand.

The terrain around the Golvorg Caverns was rocky and had barely any plant life, since there were tar pits filled with the boiling stuff everywhere. The fumes alone would make someone with a weak stomach puke, but Solomon and Camilla steeled themselves against the rancid smell and approached the caves with their weapons at the ready.

He was the first to arrive at the cave entrance and he peered into the darkness, calling over Camilla afterwards and raising a hand up while consuming it in fire to create a makeshift torch to use as light. When he glanced back at her and saw the shocked expression on her face he laughed.

"Being immortal to a certain extent has its perks." he said with a cheesy smile before he led the way inside, Camilla sticking close by him as they descended into the depths of the earth.

 **-Imperial Palace -**

 **\- Same Time -**

Jacqueline stepped into the palace dining room with the Inquisitor at her side and took a seat at the far end of the table opposite of Honest, their meeting today about a certain _problem_ for the Empire that's arisen in the last few weeks.

"What do you have to report about this supposed "One Man Army"?" asked Honest after stuffing his face with turkey, Jacqueline raising an eyebrow and chuckling.

"Oh, you mean Arius Magress?" she asked, her hand reaching for a glass of wine. "I'll deal with him later, right now I'm more interested in the Jaegers."

"Oh? So you'be discovered their location?"

"Yes, indeed. Our friends have been in the Eastern Nation for the past seven months, and do you want to know something else?" asked Jacqueline with a grin, the Prime Minister urging her to continue with a hand motion.

Jacqueline took a sip of her wine and set the glass down before saying, "Esdeath just recently gave birth to a child, a girl."

"Oh ho! That *is something else!" exclaimed Honest before his grin turned malicious. "And I'm assuming that you have a plan for them, Esdeath and her Husband that is...correct?"

"Of course, Prime Minister. I already have a subordinate of mine over there who's been watching them for some time now, and I recently just sent them a new set of orders. They're quite simple, really."

Jacqueline tapped the side of her glass and leaned back in her chair, the look on her face transforming into that of a psychopath's, complete with wide eyes and a Cheshire grin from ear to ear. Even Honest got a chill up his spine at how unhinged her expression had become.

"Cut their arms and legs off so they won't be able to escape, and then take their child and slaughter it before their very eyes. And once they're out of the way, the Eastern Nation we'll be ours for the taking." she said with a hysterical giggle, the sincerity in her voice making Honest's skin crawl.

When she finished her glass of wine, Jacqueline stood up snapped her fingers to call the Inquisitor over to her side. Before leaving she glanced back at Honest and winked, the Prime Minister raising an eyebrow.

"And about Magress, I think I remember seeing something in the Imperial Archives that's similar to the armor he wears, so I'll look into that and see what makes him such an annoyance."

 **\- Golvorg Caverns, Kingdom of Straelka -**

If what that scientist had said was true, the Danger Beasts they would meet here would be able to liquefy their bodies, so it would be exceptionally difficult to kill them if they decided to attack. So they tread carefully into the darkness, being sure to stay close by one another to negate the possibility of them being separated.

The deeper they went into the cavern they could feel the temperature drastically begin to get colder and colder to the point they got goosebumps, the creep factor going through the roof. Solomon looked to the right when he heard the sound of something dripping against the floor and saw that the tar from outside was seeping into the cave as well, which would make it even harder for them to navigate through the darkness when they could only see a few feet in front and to their left and right.

" _How deep does this cave go?_ " thought Solomon anxiously as stepped down onto a depression in the cave and nearly slipped on what he thought was water.

"Oh fucking hell, this tar is everywhere!" he cursed in a low tone as he quickly jumped over the stream of black liquid and helped Camilla over, the fire in his hand illuminating the rest of the cavern for them.

The black gunk was literally everywhere, and the fumes were making the experience that much worse. Solomon raised his arm up and increased the power of the flame so they could see more of the cavern, and what they saw almost made them gag. Drenching the walls of cavern was both dried and fresh blood, and littering the ground were countless bodies that Camilla instantly recognized as Straelkan soldiers.

She ran up and crouched down next to one, quickly discovering that they had been killed in a similar manner as her parents, with the same black substance they found at the throne room mixed in with their blood since they each had a gaping hole in their chests. When she took a closer look...she found out an even more disturbing fact.

"I...I know this man…"

"You do?" asked Solomon as she stood up and backed away slowly, a look of terror on her face.

"These men...they were the recon squad that was sent out yesterday after my parents were killed." murmured Camilla, Solomon's eyes shooting wide open when he remembered.

"They went here? Why would they come...out…" he started to say before he had a sudden realization that sent a chill running up and down his spine.

Camilla turned around towards him with the same look of shock on her face when she too realized the truth behind the soldier's unfortunate fate. Slowly the horror dawned on them and they both started to walk away from the bloodbath, the hairs on the back of their necks standing on end when they heard an inhuman shriek come from the very walls itself. Solomon looked up with the flames on his hand and had a split second to grab Camilla and throw himself with her to the side to avoid a huge amorphous blob of black tar fall from a gaping hole in the ceiling.

He grappled for his rapier and pointed it at the black mass when the creature shrieked again and began to take on the shape of a strange looking animal with long, whip-like dreadlocks coming out from its head, sharp fangs, an elongated jaw and a tail that looked somewhat like a flail. Camilla grit her teeth and raised up Claíomh Solais, a flash of light appearing before eight glowing white swords appeared in the air around her and lanced out at the creature like bullets, impaling it through its shoulders and body and pinning it to the ground.

They both growled when the creature liquefied its body and slid off the swords like it was nothing, the beast instantly lunging at the two with its claws and fangs bared. Solomon reacted by spraying the beast with fire that he had inhaled and stepped aside with Camilla, the creature howling in pain as the fire consumed its entire body and lit up the whole cavern. Solomon generated a slender blood tentacle from his right shoulder and threw his arm out, the tendril quickly wrapping around the throat of the create and instantly snapping its neck.

When the fire he had cast upon it finally extinguished, the Danger Heart's corpse was left a smoldering heap of flesh that made both of them gag and step back.

"Why _would_ they all come out here…?" asked Camilla in a soft tone, Solomon looking back at the dead soldiers and crossing his arms.

"Because that scientist sent them out here, right?"

"Yeah, I remember Wilhelm saying something about that. But why would he send them out here? Unless...he knew that they would be killed." said Camilla, the picture in her mind slowly starting to come together.

"There's something else too. Looking back when we met that scientist, the smell that I had thought was coming from the second floor? I was wrong, it was coming from _him_. He smelled like a rotting corpse." said Solomon before he walked back over to the Danger Beast he had killed and took a second whiff, cringing at its putrid odor. "And, ironically enough...this thing smells _exactly_ like him."

"So are you saying he created this thing? Why would he send us here to be killed?"asked Camilla, Solomon pacing around from one side of the cavern to the other deep in thought.

"Because we would be out of the way, since we're the only ones who are looking. And if we're not around, then there would be no one able to stop him from…oh shit."

"What?" asked Camilla before he sprinted out of the caverns full speed, the Princess following right behind him.

He didn't answer as they flew out from the cave, the moon already dominating the sky above with its soft glow...and their ride nowhere to be found.

"Solomon! What are you freaking out about?!" demanded Camilla, Solomon looking back at her with a fearful expression.

"He's one of them, he's from the Empire. That scientist, He's going to try and kill them. That's why he wanted to get rid of the only people who would've been able to discover the truth!"

"Kill who?"

"Tatsumi, Esdeath, their child, all of them! He's going to kill my friends in their sleep!"

He didn't have to repeat himself twice when Camilla fully activated her Teigu and sprouted the white majestic wings he had seen her use before, Solomon immediately getting grabbed by the Princess as she took flight and sped towards capital. Time was of the essence, they need to get back as soon as possible.

The lives of their friends depended on it.


	24. Kill the Immortal Scientist

A/N You know guys, since you people are awesome, I've uploaded this chapter early for you guys. The Doctor's character page will also be already up on the Wiki so check him out after you get done reading here. You'll find his name out in this chapter so that's step one accomplished. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 23 - Kill the Immortal Scientist**

 **\- Capital City of Cinigraed -**

Within the Royal Palace, not a single living being stirred. The Indigo Guards were performing their usual rounds, but even they with their rigorous training couldn't sense the evil presence that made its way past them and slipped through the cracks in the wall as a stream of black liquid.

When it reached its first destination it seeped out through a small crack in the wall and dropped down into a puddle on the floor, a bed resting only a few feet away. Inside it slept Tatsumi, Esdeath and Lucena, who was tucked away in her small blanket between the couple. The black bubble, when it all emerged out from the wall, began to build up on itself until it took on a shape similar to that of a human being with defined shoulders, a head and a torso.

Slowly the black tar began to regain color and soon enough a majority of its body turned into that of a long cloak with a hood, the arms following soon after allongside the head and face. Once the signature beak mask took shape, the thing's identity was finally revealed.

" _I apologize for the rude awakening Esdeath._ " thought the scientist as his fingers stretched and morphed into sharp claws while he approached the bed silently.

Suddenly the bedroom door was kicked inward, sending splinters showering all across the room and instantly waking up Tatsumi and Esdeath from the depths of sleep. Several light swords shot in through the doorway and stabbed the scientist through the chest, Solomon entering soon after and full-on tackling the man out through the window and into a nearby courtyard.

"The hell is going on?!" demanded Tatsumi while Esdeath tried to calm down Lucena and her wailing.

"No time to explain, basically someone tried to kill you in your sleep." said Camilla as she gripped her sword and leaped out through the hole Solomon had created, joining him down in the courtyard.

The two stared with scowls on their faces at the scientist as he stood back up from where he had landed and rolled his shoulders around, totally ignoring the fact that he had four swords impaled through his chest.

"So you two survived? Oh, this just won't do." said the scientist as he pulled the swords out from his chest and tossed them away, Camilla regaining control of them and returning them to her side.

He looked up when Tatsumi and Esdeath came into view through the opening Solomon's tackle had produced, a mix of anger and shock displayed on their faces due to his failed attempt on their lives.

"Under my authority as the Princess of Straelka, you, Dr. Anton Von Kupchyenko, are hereby under arrest for the attempted murder of Tatsumi, Esdeath and their child. Give up now or face my wrath." announced Camilla as she aimed her sword at the scientist, the man hunching over and glaring at them through his mask's eyeholes.

"Sorry, Princess...but you'll have to catch me first. And do hurry up, I don't like to be kept waiting." said Anton with a chuckle before his body destabilized into a massive blob of the black tar-like liquid, both Solomon and Camilla growling when it shot off along the ground.

While Camilla dematerialized her wings and gave chase after the scientist, Solomon turned around and cupped his hands around his mouth, shouting up to Tatsumi and Esdeath, "Get in touch with Lord Commander Wilhelm and tell him what happened! Tell him to bring as many soldiers as he can and to meet us at the observatory on the edge of the caldera!"

"Wait, Solomon!" exclaimed Tatsumi, but by then the Jaeger had already sprinted off after Camilla and Anton.

At that moment Wave and Chelsea came running into their room, each holding their weapons in hand and ready for a fight. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing." said Esdeath as she walked over to the nightstand beside their bed and grabbed her rapier and sheath, the blade a new one given to her by their gracious hosts since she had left hers behind after her fight with Jacqueline.

"Chelsea, do me a favor and watch over Lucena for me." she asked, the girl nodding as she returned her own blade to its sheath and strode on over to the bed where the baby was resting on the covers.

She picked her up and gently carried her back over to where Wave was, the Jaeger receiving explicit instructions from the former General to guard them with his life while they left to find Wilhelm to assist Solomon and Camilla with their would-be assassin. After a quick wardrobe change the two sprinted out past the shattered remains of their bedroom door towards the Royal Palace barracks, a dark expression on both of their faces.

If Solomon or Camilla couldn't kill that scientist...they would sure as hell make him pay dearly for trying to not only kill them, but their daughter as well.

Meanwhile, across the caldera portion of the capital, Solomon had managed to catch up with Camilla and chased Anton all the way to his observatory, where the amorphous blob he had transformed himself into slipped inside through the cracks in the locked doors. Solomon smirked as he reared back and smashed his fist into the heavy wood doors, the material unable to withstand his raw strength and crumbling against his fist.

They swung inward and they ran inside with their wits about them when they spotted Anton, back in his human form, standing in the center of the laboratory with his back turned to them. He glanced over at Camilla and she nodded, the two spreading out and creating a little distance between them so they could encircle the scientist and attack him from two different angles.

"Khehehe...you two are fools to think I wouldn't be prepared to fight you." said Anton with a sinister laugh before, all of a sudden, the doors behind them were slammed shut by two tendrils of black liquid and immediately covered by the stuff, blocking their exit.

Solomon clenched his fingers around his rapier as Anton slowly turned to face them, his hands clasped behind his back and his head lowered slightly.

"I'm assuming you work for the Empire? Since you did try to kill us?" questioned Solomon, Anton glaring at them and chuckling again.

"Indeed...only, my I align myself with the Empire because they allow me to perform my experiments without worry of persecution. Back during the First Emperor's reign, what I do now would've caused me to be put to death." said the scientist.

"What do you mean by that?"

"Isn't it obvious boy? Have you not read the history books?" asked Anton before he held his hands out and raised them up, a cackle emerging from behind his beak-shaped mask. "The name Anton Von Kupchyenko is reputed as one of the smartest scientists to ever be recruited by the First Emperor to help him create the 48 Teigu!"

Solomon and Camilla gasped and they took a step back, the scientist cackling again as he pointed to her shield and said, "In fact, I remember that one. Holy Eight: Claíomh Solais, I presume?"

"H-How? How could you have lived then _and_ now! That's impossible!" she stuttered in terror, Solomon growling as the man fixated his gaze on him.

"Very well, I suppose a little history lesson is in order." he replied after lowering his arms and closing his eyes.

"I'm not lying when I say that I lived during the reign of the First Emperor. I met the man myself when he hired me alongside a whole town's worth of scientists and the greatest minds in the world to help him craft the 48 Teigu. However, just like now, I was devoted to my experiments and discovering the secrets of life itself." he started, Camilla and Solomon staring at him cautiously when he began to slowly pace back and forth from one side of the circular room to the other.

"For years, I strived to discover life's secrets, but alas...I was stricken with an incurable disease that would kill me in a matter of months. However, my mind was sharper then ever and my thirst for knowledge was unquenchable, so I did what I needed to do in order to preserve my life and enable me to continue my experiments. I traded my mortal body for this amorphous one of mine by ingesting the Teigu I myself created with my own two hands, Corruption Rising: Morbus." he said, the lower half of his body slowly beginning to turn into the black tar-like liquid they had all come to hate and despise, his footsteps disappearing and getting replaced by a slurping noise as he slid across the ground.

"I had no idea what it would do, but I soon found out that the black liquid I had created from the blood and secretion of a certain Super-class Danger Beast ate away all of my internal organs and blood, turning me into an empty shell filled only with this corruption, I like to call it." stated Anton as he raised a hand up and closed his fingers into a fist.

Camilla gagged when an image of the scientist's insides getting eaten away like some mid-day snack popped into her mind, Solomon only grimacing and holding back the bile that had risen up to the back of his throat.

"However...it was all worth it. That disease could no longer affect me, and thus I continued my research and experiments, gaining new knowledge as the years went by. I came to realize though that following the moral guidelines I was taught to abide by would do me no service, so I ventured into the realm of animal experimentation, and once that had run out of usefulness...I turned to human experimentation. That, my friends, is when I truly became fascinated by the human body. It's amazing how fragile a human is...and my curiosity was what drove me to figure out what exactly made them _tick_. Would one still be able to live with only one lung, or what about a stomach?"

"You sick mother fucker…even Esdeath before Tatsumi was able to change her wasn't as bad as you." growled Solomon as his back ripped open to allow two blood tentacles to slither out and modify their tips to look like battle-axes.

"I have lived for a thousand years, and have accumulated knowledge the greatest of scientists can only dream of obtaining. My mind is absolute! I know everything, and more! Do you really think you can compare her to the likes of *me?!" bellowed Anton, the pool of corruption gathering around him becoming volatile when his anger flared up from behind his usual stoic personality.

"I don't care how long you've lived. I'm going to make you pay with your life for killing Camilla's parents." snarled Solomon, the Jaeger's animosity for the scientist shooting through the roof.

Anton laughed again as the pool around him grew even larger, Solomon and Camilla taking another step back and holding their breaths when the noxious fumes the vile liquid secreted began to fill up the laboratory.

"You may be among the Empire's strongest, but I am the Empire's smartest. It will take time, but I will discover your weakness, and when I do...I will exploit it and destroy you!" he proclaimed before he swept his arm out at them, several tendrils of the black liquid lancing out at the two of them.

Camilla raised up her shield and block the tendrils fired at her while Solomon slashed them to pieces with his sword, the two rushing at the scientist now that his attack had failed. Camilla swung at his neck with her sword and he moved to the side to avoid it, Solomon following by lunging with his blade at his gut. He grinned when the blade pierced through his cloak and emerged out of his back, but Anton chuckled as he raised a hand and backhanded him several feet away, his sword remaining imbedded in the scientist's body.

Camilla attempted to attack him again but he raised his left hand up, a tendril of corruption emerging from the pool around him and snaking around her leg to lift her into the air and throw her back against the far wall of the laboratory.

"Petty weapons such as this won't be able to harm me." stated Anton as he pulled Solomon's rapier out from his gut and snapped it in half, the wound in his gut sealing itself up while the fabric of his cloak repaired itself like magic.

" _Dammit, how can we harm a guy that's completely made out of liquid?!_ " thought Solomon frantically, but he had no time to think of a plan when Anton raised both arms up and pushed them towards him, a massive wave of corruption emerging around him and going straight for him.

"Immortalis Aestuo!" he yelled before exhaling a massive stream of fire that struck the wave head-on, matching it in power and negating it.

Camilla leaped over the contact point of the opposing forces and sent out all eight light sword constructs at her disposal, the blades zooming straight at Anton and attacking him from all angles. He blocked and deflected the blades by forming several tendrils around him to combat them, and he used the same tactic against Camilla when she leaped into the fray as well. The two exchanged blows with one another before Anton liquefied his body and slipped away from her, reforming close to the wall where a lever was built into the stone.

"Have a nice trip." he said before pulling the lever, Camilla's eyes widening when the floor suddenly dropped out from underneath her and Solomon.

They plunged down into the depths of a hidden floor beneath the observatory and struck a metal platform built into the earth, Solomon noticing that grates were built into the circumference of the circle as soon as he got back on his feet. He looked back up to where they had fallen from and paled when the hole seemed like a tiny dot, the distance they must've fallen easily exceeding a mile...at least.

He grabbed Camilla by the arm and quickly retreated to the far end of the platform when Anton jumped down into the hole across from them with a sickening plop, the amorphous being cackling as he crossed his arms and glared at them.

"There's no chance of surviving for you now." he said before the platform rumbled, Solomon glancing over his shoulder and cursing when a huge mass of corruption gushed out through the grates and covered the platform all across its outside edge, creating a deadly arena ring where if you fall out...your death is assured.

"Solomon, what do we do now?" asked Camilla, Solomon's fists tightening as he tried to think of a way to combat the scientist.

" _I can't use Maximo Vocem Infurnus because there's a high chance that Camilla will get hurt, and she can't user the Mountain Cutter due to it being such a confined space. Damn, he really did prepare for this._ " he thought with a disgruntled look, Anton chuckling at them and their inability to come up with a way to kill him.

" _All I need to do is tire them to the point they will be unable to escape, then I'll use my Trump Card to kill them for sure. All I need to do is wait._ "

"I-I don't know…" whispered back Solomon, Camilla growling before she remembered their encounter with the Danger Beast back in the Golvorg Caverns.

"Wait, do you remember what you did to that creature earlier?" she asked, Solomon's face brightening when he had a eureka moment and grinned.

"Of course!" he said before he absorbed his blood and sealed up the skin on his back, Anton watching with a wary eye as the Jaeger stepped forward. "Camilla, follow my lead."

Before he could do anything else Anton threw his arm forward and transformed it into slender tendrils of corruption that lanced out at him, Solomon standing firm and allowing them to skewer him through the chest and cast his blood all across the platform. However, completely opposite of the scientist's expectations, Solomon grinned and looked at him as he grasped onto two of the tendrils with his hands and held on tightly.

"Sorry, but your calculations are a little off doctor. If you haven't already figured out by now...I'm a little special too." he said, flames starting to flicker across his skin.

To Anton's shock, the man burst into flames and cleaved right through the tendrils impaling him with just his arm. A second later he ran at the scientist and leaped right for him, Anton at a loss of what to do when encountered with a person _on_ fire running straight at him.

Solomon rammed his knuckles deep into Anton's cheek and launched him back into the wall of the hole, his body crashing into the rock and creating a large crater on impact from the force of the blow. Unafraid of what would happen, Solomon stepped into the ring of corruption surrounding the platform and grunted when several tendrils controlled by Anton shot up and cut through his legs, arms and torso to try and bind his movements.

"What the hell are you?!" stammered Anton as he dropped to the ground and raised his arm up, several other tendrils forming and wrapping around Solomon's arms tightly.

With a quick fluid motion they were ripped out of the shoulder joints, Camilla covering her mouth and gasping when Solomon's blood splattered all over the ground. He coughed but only grinned when he manifested two of his own tendrils made of his blood that sliced through the corruption binding him, freeing him from Anton's grasp and allowing him to attack him again.

"The name's Solomon Glass, and I'm the guy that's gonna kick your ass!" bellowed the Jaeger as he rammed his knee into Anton's jaw and bashed him to the side with one of his blood tentacles, the scientist growling as he turned himself into a puddle of corruption and quickly ran away to another side of the platform.

As soon as he began to return to his human form Camilla smashed her shield into him and threw him back against the wall, her eight light swords attacking him again and cutting both of his arms off as retribution for doing the same thing to Solomon.

"You bitch!" snarled Anton, Camilla scowling at him and his remark. "I should've killed you alongside your parents!"

"You shut your fucking mouth!" roared Solomon as he ran at Anton, his arms now fully regenerated thanks to his Trump Card and the fire that had consumed him earlier now gone, and punched him again in the jaw hard enough to throw him back against the wall.

Before he could continue his assault, Anton slipped away by merging with the pool of corruption beneath them and reemerged on the complete other side of the platform, his arms now back and his eyes blazing with fury.

"With my mind and will as testament, I will not be broken!" he snarled as he created two massive blobs of the black liquid that he sent right at Camilla and Solomon, the former manifesting her wings and grabbing Solomon to avoid the corruption by flying up and out of its reach.

That's when he noticed that instead of being colder down in the hole, it had actually gotten hotter, and through the cracks of one of the craters Anton's body had created as a result of striking the rock he noticed the faintest sliver of light. Instantly he figured out how they would be able to kill Anton, so he shared his idea with Camilla and she grinned.

"That's genius. Be careful though." she said before dropping him, Solomon falling back down to the platform and landing on both with his eyes set on the crack he had spotted from above.

"I've wasted enough time playing with you two. If you would be so kind as to die, I'd appreciate it." said Anton, Solomon laughing as he tightened his fists and cracked his neck.

"Not likely."

He ran at the scientist and reared his arm back, Anton easily sidestepping the attack and moving away from him and watching as his fist struck uselessly against the rock...or so he thought.

"You missed. How expected of a pitiful attack like that."

"Did I?" asked Solomon as he looked back at Anton over his shoulder, the scientist becoming confused as to what he meant before he saw the rock face crack some more and allow more of the light beyond it to come in.

He froze when a tiny drop of a bright orange and yellow liquid similar to honey dripped out through the crack and struck the corruption, easily burning it away and melting through the platform beneath it.

"Why you-!" started Anton before Camilla's light swords stabbed through his body again and imbedded themselves into the platform, binding his movements and keeping him in place for the few seconds Solomon needed to rear his other arm back and prepare himself to jump as high as he could.

"I alone contain a thousand year's worth of knowledge! All of my knowledge would be lost to eternity! Would you really want that to happen?!" he pleaded, Solomon rolling his eyes.

"Eh, it's an acceptable loss." he said before he rammed his fist again into the rock and cracked the rock enough to where the magma contained in the isolated chamber behind it could easily break it.

Solomon jumped up when the searing hot liquid burst out onto the platform and quickly consumed the corruption and Anton, the scientist screaming in agony as he burst into flames and began to melt into an indistinguishable figure. Camilla caught him and began to flap her wings, rising slowly up and away from the rapidly filling hole and watching with smiles on their faces as Anton's body disappeared beneath the magma.

After two minutes of travelling back up the hole the scientist had carved out beneath the observatory they finally reached the top, with Camilla setting Solomon on his feet and landing next to him as she deactivated her Teigu and let out a tired sigh of relief.

"Princess!"

They both turned and watched Wilhelm with several Indigo Guards run into the laboratory, Esdeath and Tatsumi following behind them.

"Are you okay?" he asked, Camilla nodding.

"Yeah, we're fine."

"What of that scientist?" asked Tatsumi, Solomon chuckling as he pointed with his thumb back over his shoulder to the hole they had just flown out of.

"He's down there, although I don't think he'll be climbing back up."

Wilhelm walked to the edge of the chasm and looked down into its depths, smirking when he saw the glow of the magma at its bottom. Esdeath and Tatsumi looked for themselves and they both grinned, the fate of the person who had tried to kill them a fitting one.

"He deserved that." said Esdeath, the three turning away from the hole and looking back at Solomon and Camilla.

"So, I heard the basic overview from Esdeath and Tatsumi here, but why did Anton really try to kill all of you?" asked Wilhelm as he crossed his arms.

Solomon let out a heavy sigh and put his hands into his pockets, his gaze drifting back to the hole. "Anton wasn't who he said he was. He was in league with the Empire...and I'm pretty sure we can assume who ordered him to try and kill us."

"Jacqueline…" murmured Tatsumi, Solomon nodding.

"He was an agent of the Empire? Curse them!" swore Wilhelm before Camilla walked up to him and rested a hand on his shoulder to comfort him. "Thank you, Camilla, but what do we do now?"

"What do you mean?"

"As the Princess and next in line for the throne, and in the...absence of your parents, you're now the commander-in-chief of all Straelkan forces." said Wilhelm with a straight face, Camilla's expression quickly turning into one of shock and realization when the truth finally came out.

He was right. With the nation's Kaiser and Kaiserin both gone, the next person in line to be the leading figure of the government and army would be either the crowned Prince of Princess, which in this case would be the latter. And so with the decision of an entire nation's army hanging on her words, she remembered the words of the scientist she had considered her ally and how much pain and strife he had caused her and her home to feel.

"Uh, Camilla, before you say anything, you might want to have a look at this." stated Solomon from behind her, both Wilhelm and the Princess turning towards where he stood.

He had a rolled up parchment in his grasp and he held it up for them to see, Camilla walking over to him once the lever that dropped the floor of the observatory had been returned to its original position. He handed her the paper and she read over it carefully, her eyes darting back and forth across the words until she reached the end.

"He...he killed my parents and was planning on getting rid of all of us. The Jaegers, me, Wilhelm, all of the leading political figures of Straelka." she said, the paper falling from her fingers when her hand started to shake out of rage. "When we were all dead...the Empire was going to send a fleet of soldiers to invade and take over Straelka. And it was sent here by the Empire's Great General to open up the gates for them as soon as it happened."

Everyone within the observatory was left floored, in every sense of the word. Esdeath clenched her first and growled, an image of Jacqueline emerging in the back of her mind.

" _Damn you, Jacqueline...you're proving to be a bigger problem each and every day…_ "

She left her thoughts when Camilla lowered her gaze and stood perfectly still, the laboratory totally silent except for the slight buzzing and bubbling of the equipment and alchemist tools going on around them.

"Lord Commander Wilhelm, send out a call to all branches of the military across the entire nation to gather at the military seaport of Berline while leaving enough men behind in each city, including the capital, to defend against hostile Danger Beasts." she said, Wilhelm standing at attention as he prepared to receive the rest of her orders.

Camilla turned towards him with a darkened gaze on her face as she gripped her sword tightly and stabbed its tip into the floor. "The Empire has made a grave mistake in trying to topple the Kingdom of Straelka. In retaliation, as Princess of Straelka, I declare war on the Empire!"

"At once, Princess!" replied Wilhelm with a salute before he swiftly left the observatory with the Indigo Guard members he had come there with.

Following them were Camilla, Solomon, Esdeath and Tatsumi, the group making the trek through the caldera city back to the Royal Palace to get some actual rest after their rude awakening by the traitorous scientist. Solomon bid farewell to Tatsumi and Esdeath, Chelsea and Wave meeting them at their new room with Lucena in the former's arm, before he led Camilla to her room like he had done after her parent's funeral.

He opened the door and immediately she almost collapsed to the floor, Solomon quickly working to place her sword and Teigu off on the side against the wall while he threw her arm over his shoulder and carried her to her bed. While he turned around she quickly changed out of her armor back into her grey keyhole sweater, but instead of putting on pants she opted to stay in her panties.

"T-Thank you, and I'm sorry...my legs just gave out on me…" she said as she sat down finally, Solomon chuckling as he fell down next to her and ran a hand through his hair.

"Believe me, I'm exhausted too...even though I don't show it, regenerating wounds and such really takes a lot out of me. Plus I still feel the pain too, so right now...my arms are on fire." he said, Camilla looking at him and remembering that he had both of his arms ripped off. "But, in the end, it was worth it."

"Solomon...I wanted to thank you, for everything you've done." said Camilla as she placed a hand on top of his, the Jaeger's cheeks brightening up.

"Of course, it was no trouble."

Suddenly he felt something incredibly warm wrap around his arm and he looked down, his eyes widening in surprise when he saw that Camilla was resting her chin on his shoulder and was smiling at him. He also quickly found out that the warmth his arm was experiencing was due to the fact she had pressed her breasts up against it and had no intention of stopping.

"Camilla, you remember what I said right?" asked Solomon, Camilla nodding before she left his side for a moment to crawl across the bed over to where her night stand rested and opened the drawer.

She smiled happily as she sat back on her legs while glancing back over her shoulder at Solomon, the object in her hand bound to change his view.

"Will this suffice…?" she asked as she brought her hand up, the condom in between her index and middle finger catching Solomon's gaze.

"Camilla, I-"

"Solomon Glass, are you really going to deny the wishes of your Princess?" she asked seductively as she slowly made her way back over to him, her finger pressing up against the base of his neck and pushing him down onto his back.

She climbed over top of him and smiled, Solomon rolling his eyes when she reached up and one by one she placed each of his hands in her ass cheeks, the soft touch of her smooth skin feeling almost like heaven to his fingertips.

"Well, when you put it like that…" he said as Camilla sat back on his groin, her legs folded up beneath her, and hooked her fingertips underneath the edge of her sweater.

Solomon watched with a slight grin as she slowly lifted the sweater up, first her stomach revealing itself before she finally brought it up and over her chest, her ample sized breasts now freed from their confinement beneath the clothing. She retracted her arms out of the sleeves and threw it over her shoulder, smiling at the look Solomon had on his face.

"I bet you're glad to finally see these...I always caught you sneaking glances at them." she said playfully, Solomon scoffing and rolling his eyes.

"No, of course not! I-" he started to say before he was cut off when Camilla leaned down and pressed her breasts up against his face.

"Hush. A woman knows these things. Now…"

She reached back and grasped his pants zipper, casually moving it down and opening it up to allow her hand to slip inside and rummage around for a second until she pulled back out his dick and started to stroke it.

Camilla leaned back to a sitting position, allowing Solomon to breath properly again, and while he switched his hand's position from her ass cheeks to her hips she put the condom she had in her other hand around his cock and looked straight into his eyes. Slowly she brought her hips down and let out a moan when she felt her insides spread apart as more of his length passed by her folds.

When she felt her thighs touch skin she placed her hands on his bare chest and leaned forward for the final time, her elbows digging into the sheets in either side of Solomon's shoulders while her face hovered inches away from his.

No words were shared between them as she kissed him passionately with her eyes closed, Solomon matching her feelings and returning the kiss. Finally, after years of keeping it under wraps due to their positions, they were able to embrace one another not as friends...but as lovers.

 **\- Port City of Berline -**

 **\- Two Days Later -**

When the Princess spoke her mind, the nation of Straelka answered immediately. And upon arriving at the port city of Berline, they were astounded by its construction and facilities that could contain hundreds, if not thousands of troops and equipment. They were led by Camilla and Solomon to a large battle tower that overlooked the plaza leading to the closed off dock the city possessed, and when they reached a balcony situated at its peak they noticed there were already at least ten steel-plated transport ships undoubtedly powered by steam docked there, ready to receive troops and equipment.

Protecting the harbor was a large sea wall flanked by two ballistae towers, and the only way a ship could get past was through the large metal gate built in between the structures that could be raised or lowered to offer entry.

The plaza, on the other hand, was intensely fortified with towering stone walls flanking either side, each possessing several bunkers on the cliffs the walls were built into that held steam powered cannons capable of firing heavy iron rods that could punch through reinforced steel plates with ease.

"Wow...why are there so many defense emplacements for just one city? I could understand the capital, but why here?" asked Wave as he observed the plaza, Camilla leaning against the balcony railing and grinning.

"Straelka has Vermillion to thank for that."

"Who?"

"Kaiserin Vermillion, the ruler of the Kingdom of Straelka around the same time the Empire was embroiled in a civil war." said Camilla, Solomon nodding when he remembered the name and chuckled.

"Well what was so special about her?" asked Run, Solomon crossing his arm and looking back at him.

"Out of all the Kaisers and Kaiserins of Straelka, aside from Bismarak of course, Vermillion is the most well known and famous among all the rest due to her unyielding desire to protect the nation and ensure its survival." he said, Tatsumi and Esdeath, who was holding Lucena in her arms, listening in when since their interest had been piqued as well.

"To get an accurate grasp on the situation in the Empire, she left the kingdom in the hands of the Lord Commander and her advisors and travelled there, living under a different identity and seeing for herself the other fabled Teigu like her own in action on the battlefield. Upon returning to Straelka with a new sense of the affairs going on in the Empire, she made a complete overhaul of the nation's military and was the one that initiated of the construction of the defensive walls and emplacements made around every city, including the capital." explained Camilla, the Jaegers astounded that the leader of a nation would go so far as to risk her life by going to a war-torn country.

"You say overhaul, so does that mean she reorganized it or what?" asked Esdeath.

"Yes, to a point. She was the one that founded the Royal Air Suppression Forces, but more importantly she was able to document the abilities and techniques of a majority of the Teigu the Empire and other forces possessed, bring them back with her, and implement them into a radical new training regimen that the military adopted over the previous one." stated Solomon before he looked back out over the plaza and chuckled. "Thanks to Vermillion, the Kingdom of Straelka military became a force that could not only fight the Empire's normal soldiers on equal footing, but they could also deal accordingly with their Teigu users as well."

"Amazing…" uttered Chelsea in awe.

At that moment Wilhelm made his presence known by walking out onto the balcony and approaching Camilla, the Princess turning to face the Lord Commander. He saluted her and informed her that preparations were complete, and that all they needed to do was signal for the beginning of the loading operation.

"You may begin, Wilhelm." she replied, the Lord Commander nodding once before he pulled out a whistle and blew it.

A few seconds later and louder and more powerful whistle was blown near the base of the tower, the gates on either side of the structure moving aside.

"Esdeath, you're a former General of the Empire, right? Do you think you can give me a rough estimate of the manpower the Empire currently has?" asked Camilla, Esdeath putting a hand on her hip and thinking momentarily.

"If I had to say, including the special divisions aside from the assassination squads, since Jacqueline eliminated those, the Empire's overall military strength is about ten ground armies and one naval unit, each led by a General, the Imperial Guard led by the Great General, our good _friend_ Jacqueline, and the Faceless. Overall, it's about 5.4 million strong, but with the Teigu factored in, it may as well be around 7.4 million." she said, Camilla nodding before she held a hand up to her ear and grew silent.

They followed suite and after a few moments of complete silence they started to hear the sound of thousands, if not _millions_ of men, marching in unison. Tatsumi leaned over the edge of the balcony and was instantly floored, the rest of the Jaegers coming up next to him and experiencing the same feeling he was.

"That is indeed a high number, but what you're seeing and hearing right now is the full military might of the entire Kingdom of Straelka military." informed Camilla with a grin before turning back to Wilhelm. "How many soldiers do we possess again? I've kind of forgotten."

"Adding up the manpower of all branches of the military including the Indigo Guard, our total manpower tops out at 10.8 million men strong, Princess." he said, Esdeath and Tatsumi whirling around in shock at the staggering number of soldiers.

" _10.8 million men?!_ " thought Tatsumi in disbelief, but when he turned back to watch the organized columns of fully armored Straelkan soldiers make their way towards the transport ships, he couldn't help but believe.

Their footsteps echoed off the walls of the plaza like thunder, the rattling of their armor coming second after it. A break in the lines came along and Wave pointed out three rows of around thirty strange, caterpillar-like machines inching along behind the troops, the other Jaegers taking notice and wondering just what exactly they were.

"Hey, Camilla, what are those things?" asked Chelsea, the Princess following her gaze to the machines.

"Oh, yeah! Those are steam-powered tanks that are a part of the Mechanized Division of the Royal Army. It's armor is segmented so it can move around like a caterpillar and so that it actually lift itself up and over objects and crush it with the sheer weight it has." she said, the Jaegers once again astonished.

Suddenly a large shadow passed over them and they looked up, the familiar underbelly of the airship they had seen upon first arriving at the capital city flying overhead. Only, instead of one, an entire row of four other airships followed behind it and took up a position over the transports, hovering in the air in wait for their allies on the ground to finish loading the first wave of soldiers onto the ten transport ships. A quick explanation from Wilhelm revealed to them that the airships were the strongest piece of equipment the military of Straelka possessed, with the catwalks underneath their metal hulls and structure possessing massive projectile launchers capable of shooting long streams of fire that can cover a massive area. If that wasn't enough, the airships also carried dozens of firebombs that could be dropped from the hatches on their underbellies and lay waste to any ground force that would be underneath it.

With five of those behemoths, Esdeath could only dream of the devastation they could cause in only a matter of minutes.

Once the first ten transport ships were filled with men and tanks, they moved aside to the other end of the harbor and allowed a second fleet of transport ships to move in and continue taking in the seemingly endless flow of men and machine. Soon another division of the Royal Army, the Artillery Division, made their appearance when Esdeath pointed out groups of men pushing steam-powered trebuchets and cannons on wheels towards the boats.

"I always thought the Empire was the strongest military force on the planet, but after seeing this...I think I was wrong." said Wave, Solomon laughing as he walked up to him and threw an arm around his shoulder.

"Don't worry, we'll try to go easy on them.".

"Princess, your ride is here." informed Wilhelm as he pointed to an approaching airship, the Princess and the Jaegers stepping away from the balcony to await its arrival.

When it pulled up next to the tower a pair of crewmen tethered to the catwalk closest to them extended out a platform with railings so they could make their way over and board the airship for the ride to the Empire.

"Welcome aboard Princess." said one of the crewmembers as soon as she set foot on the catwalk, Solomon right behind her.

While Run, Wave and Chelsea made their way over to the airship, Tatsumi turned around Wilhelm and clapped a hand on Wilhelm's shoulder while looking him straight in the eyes. "We'll be back for Lucena when the revolution is over, okay?"

"Please take good care of our daughter, she means the world to us." said Esdeath, the Lord Commander nodding as he held his arms out so that she could place her into his care.

"Don't worry. I swear on my honor and position to look after her as if she were my own flesh and blood just like I did with Camilla when she was a baby." he said, his gaze dropping to Lucena for a moment as he smiled when Lucena looked up at him with her silver eyes and giggled.

"Thank you so much for doing this." said Tatsumi before he gave him a little salute and climbed up on the bridge and walked over to the airship where the others were waiting, Esdeath following after she gave a final goodbye to Lucena.

Wilhelm gave them all a wave as the platform was returned to the airship and the goliath of a machine's propellers started to spin fast and faster, Camilla returning the wave as they moved away from the tower and return to the rest of the fleet of airships hovering over the harbor.

Esdeath and Tatsumi, while the others made their way through the maze of catwalks towards an elevator that would raise them into the interior of the airship, remained still as they watched the tower get farther and farther away. He glanced at her and just from the look on her face he could tell she was hurting on the inside due to them leaving their daughter behind.

To comfort her, he wrapped an arm around her and pulled her close, Esdeath smiling letting out a sigh. "Don't worry, she'll be fine. Wilhelm's a good person."

"I know, it's just…"

"Just what?"

"I...I'm afraid. I never used to feel this before I had Lucena, but now that we have a daughter...I'm afraid that I won't be able to see her again." said Esdeath, Tatsumi's smile vanishing.

He rubbed her shoulder and looked at the tower with her, "I'm afraid too, but I also have faith that we'll be able to get through this together. Just like you've said before, we're capable of taking care of ourselves."

She looked up at him and when she saw his smile reappear, she couldn't help but smile too and rested her head on his shoulder, Tatsumi leading her away from the edge and to the elevator so that they could meet up with the rest of their friends inside for the long trip back to the Empire. On the way there, they would be able to figure out a plan on what they would need to do to get the revolution back on track.

The one factor they were all worried about though was this...what has become of the Empire while they were gone?


	25. Return

A/N Our time in the Kingdom of Straelka is now over, it's time to return to the Empire...and I can only begin to wonder how much it has changed in the seven months they've been gone. If it's Jacqueline and the Prime Minister we're talking about...it can't be good. Also, I've put all of the information on Straelka and the war machines they have produced onto the wiki for your viewing pleasure. I will say this, a lot of aspects that went into its creation like the capital and the city of Berline, along with the airship and the tanks, were taken from Avatar: the Last Airbender. God I loved that show. Okay, enough ranting, back to the story. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 24 - Return**

 **\- Capital District Building No. 23, Reconditioning Department -**

 **\- 10:00 a.m -**

"So...Anton is dead, huh?" said Jacqueline to herself as she set down the letter from Kahfka, her eyes glancing up at the ceiling of her personal torture chamber.

Kahfka had already stated she would be back in under a week, so she was glad that she would be coming soon, but that was the only good news her letter contained. After observing the fight between Anton, the Princess of Straelka and one of the Jaegers, she had also learned that wanting to take revenge for the deaths of her parents as well as the plot against her and the other leading political figures of her nation, she had declared war on the Empire and was currently on her way with the Jaegers and the entirety of the Kingdom of Straelka's military at her side.

Judging by how Kahfka had put it, their manpower was easily twice that, if not more then the Empire's. However, instead of worrying about it, Jacqueline merely laughed and tossed aside the letter as she leaned back in her chair and stretched her back.

" _Even if they possess the largest army on the planet...they still won't be able to stop me. And since I'll have a week before they arrive...this'll give me time to prepare._ " she thought with a smile on her face.

She got up from her chair and walked over to one of the walls of the small room, running her hand along its smooth face until she found a small button invisible to the naked eye unless you were up close and pressed it. A portion of the wall slid aside to reveal a built-in shower and she quickly undressed, intending to clean herself of the blood that had gotten on her after a day's work of torturing before she left to present her findings to the Emperor and the Prime Minister.

When the hot water began to spray out of the shower head and run through her hair and down her body, she began to formulate plans and backup plans that she would use against the Jaegers. " _I'll let the other Generals deal with the enemy army, and to ensure our control over the Western Nations and make sure those revolutionaries don't get any ideas, I'll have the Hellraisers reposition themselves there from the Shisuikan._ " she thought as she poured some shampoo into her hand and started to scrub her hair, suds quickly starting to form from the back and forth motion of her fingers.

While she was lost deep in her thoughts, the Inquisitor had pulled himself up a stool next to the entrance to her personal torture chamber and retrieved a book from his coat pocket. He removed the monocle covering his right eye and barely opened his eyes while bringing up a pair of bifocals in order to begin reading the book.

" _The Legend of Razgriz...seems like a good read._ " he thought to himself as he turned to page one and leaned back, his eyes slowly scanning the first sentence.

After only two minutes of reading he was so absorbed in the story that he didn't even hear someone approach him and tap him on the shoulder, the Inquisitor jumping and whipping his head up to see who had snuck up on him.

His surprise quickly faded though when he recognized who it was and crossed a lanky leg over while setting down his book, a grin on his face.

"We weren't expecting you back so soon. How'd you do it?"

"Well, once I figured out I could just create ice around my wrists and ankles and fly with them, I was able to get across the ocean much quicker." said Kahfka with a chuckle as she walked up to the door next to him and placed a hand on its face.

"Try not to surprise her too much." said the Inquisitor as he returned to his book, Kahfka rolling her eyes before she pushed the door inward and crept inside.

When she heard the sound of water running she guessed that Jacqueline was showering...and instead of making herself known, her lips curled upward into a mischievous smile. She made sure to close the door behind her and tip-toed over to the open shower door, being sure to stay out of sight as she slowly undressed.

After that was out of the way Kahfka peered around the door into the shower and blushed at the sight of Jacqueline in the shower.

" _Plus, there's still the matter of that Magress character…_ " she thought with a frown on her face, the mysterious armored character's identity continuing to elude her.

Suddenly she felt a second pair of arms gently wrap around her waist and hug her tightly, her first action being to look back over her shoulder to see who in their right mind would intrude. She was in for an even greater surprise when she saw Kahfka looking right back at her with a smile on her face.

"Kahfka?! How did you get here so quickly?" asked Jacqueline, Kahfka giggling as she started to slide her hand down her stomach towards that spot between her thighs.

"Do you really need to know the details? What matters is that I'm here, *right?" she replied, Jacqueline biting her lip and letting out a tiny gasp when she felt Kahfka's fingers begin to rub against her tender spot.

"H-Hey, no fair...you caught me off guard…"

"Shush…" whispered Kahfka into her ear as she used her other hand to start fondling one of Jacqueline's breasts. "It's been seven months...and you seem stressed."

Jacqueline could feel her body start to get hotter, and it wasn't because of the water still showering her and Kahfka. She couldn't keep her legs closed any longer and spread her feet out a little, Kahfka taking full advantage of the situation and pushing her index and middle fingers past her entrance and into her sex.

"Mmm...don't stop that…" she murmured, Kahfka starting to pinch her breast's nipple lightly in tandem with her fingers massaging her insides.

A few minutes later after the pair spent getting dirty and clean at the same time, they emerged from within the chamber and stared at the Inquisitor sitting close by, who was absorbed in his book once again.

"I'll be off, my Inquisitor. Are you coming?" asked Jacqueline as she slipped on her trench coat.

"Sorry Mistress, but this book has captivated my attention, and I'm asking for your permission to remain here and finish it." he replied without looking up from the pages, Jacqueline chucking.

"Of course you can, you deserve some rest. Come on Kahfka, let's go to the Imperial Palace."

They made it to the large defensive wall encompassing the palace in good time and were immediately let past by the Imperial Guards, the two females taking their time in getting to the throne room they had become familiar with. Jacqueline walked in first and approached the throne, kneeling before the Emperor and the Prime Minister as per custom while Kahfka remained off on the side, crossing her arms over and watching silently.

"Greetings, Miss Jacqueline. What do you have to report today?" asked Honest with a smile, Jacqueline bringing her gaze up and opening her eyes.

"Unfortunately, Prime Minister, your Highness, I come bearing distasteful news." she said with a regretful tone in her voice, the Prime Minister's smile wavering.

"Go ahead, Great General." spoke the child Emperor.

"The plan to assassinate Jaegers and the leading political figures of the Eastern Nation has failed, and as a result, the Princess has declared war on the Empire. She's currently crossing the ocean that separate our two nations with a large military force around 10.8 million strong." informed Jacqueline, both the Emperor and Honest paling at the thought of that many troops.

When the Prime Minister glanced down at the young Emperor and saw the frightened expression on his face, he quickly regained his cheerful composition and rested a reassuring hand on the boy's shoulder.

"Don't worry your Highness, everything will be fine."

"Indeed, Prime Minister." said Jacqueline with a small grin. "I already have a plan set in motion. I'll be mobilizing my armies to meet them head-on and I'll send Lieutenant Colonel Costner's division to keep order in the Western Nations."

"Oh, splendid. With your armies and your subordinates, the Eastern Mation won't be able to stand a chance." the Emperor said happily, Jacqueline chuckling at his enthusiasm.

"Actually, about my subordinates. Kahfka, my dear, would you come here for a second?"

Jacqueline motioned to her to walk over and Kahfka pushed herself off the wall, striding over to her side and bowing once to the Prime Minister and the Emperor each to show her respect for their positions.

"You remember Kahfka, correct? She assisted me in tracking down that Danger Beast Hunter and soon after the Jaegers when the fool led us right to them. In the fight, I managed to sever one of Esdeath's arms...and that's when I had a thought." said Jacqueline with an evil smile as she took a few steps back to give Kahfka the floor. "I took that thought alongside that arm of hers and brought it back with us, and what resulted of it was something truly wonderful. Kahfka, if you will."

Honest raised an eyebrow in anticipation as Kahfka closed her eyes and stood perfectly still, her nostrils flaring as she let out a deep breath. Suddenly she flicked her hands up and instantly several large shards of pinkish-red ice manifested in the air around her, both Honest and the Emperor gasping in surprise.

"She's become a user of Demon's Extract? How?" asked Honest, Kahfka grinning as she pointed to the tattoo at the base of her neck.

"Jacqueline and a colleague of hers drained the blood out of Esdeath's arm and gave it to me to drink." she explained, the Emperor's eyes wide with awe at the coveted ability while Honest smiled maliciously.

" _Now the Eastern Nation's military will stand no chance against Jacqueline and her subordinate thanks to her gaining Demon's Extract. Those two make a deadly pair, and with the Inquisitor, it's a triple threat. It's complete overkill...and I love it!_ "

"And what of the Inquisitor? Will he also be joining you in the fight against the Eastern Nation army?" asked the Emperor, Jacqueline returning to her previous spot and shaking her head.

"No. The Inquisitor will be doing something far more important then waste his time with pathetic foot soldiers." she replied after crossing her arms. "He will continue where that worthless Danger Beast Hunter couldn't. He will be the one to kill the Jaegers, and I can assure you, Prime Minister...he will _not_ fail."

"What makes you so sure that he'll be able to take on the Jaegers alone?" asked Honest, his doubt only making Jacqueline smile.

"The Inquisitor is a very special person, Prime Minister. I've known him for a very, _very_ long time, and I've seen him fight. That little altercation with that General where he shot his knee caps out was just a tiny taste of how extraordinarily powerful he is."

"He's that strong?" questioned the Emperor.

"As he is right now, if I were to engage the Inquisitor in one on one combat with nothing to hold us back...he would kill me." stated Jacqueline with a straight face.

All three of them, Honest, the Emperor and Kahfka, were left totally floored. The Great General, who was already incredibly powerful since she could take on both Esdeath and Tatsumi single-handedly, wouldn't be able to survive a fight with her own subordinate? Just how strong _was_ the Inquisitor?

Several minutes later, after they finished talking with the Prime Minister and Emperor, Jacqueline took a detour from her route back to the Reconditioning Department with Kahfka and instead travelled to another building opened by the capital. Only it wasn't obscure or ambiguous like the Reconditioning Department's home or the former home of the assassination squads.

The building they arrived to was Capital District Building No. 1, the very first built after the founding of the Empire, and aside from the Imperial Palace it was the most heavily guarded building in the entire city. Day in and day out, the massive fortress-like building was kept secure by members of both the Imperial Police and the Faceless.

The reason why? Deep within the building in an underground bunker, which is even more heavily guarded then the surface, lies the vault that contains the Empire's stash of unused Teigu.

"So, why are we here again?" asked Kahfka after they were allowed past the reinforced doors of the building and into the lobby area, which consisted of a red carpet leading them straight to another pair of doors guarded by two Faceless.

"I remember reading something in a book I found in the Imperial Archives about a certain Teigu that could control nature." said Jacqueline over her shoulder as they pushed vast the second pair of doors. "What interested me more though was that written next to its information was an excerpt stating that the Teigu itself was designed to act sentiently, like a Biological-type, only nowhere on it did I find something about it being one."

"So...is it some new type of Teigu?" asked Kahfka, Jacqueline turning around and grinning before they began to descend a large flight of spiral stairs down into the earth.

"That is what we're gonna find out, my dear Kahfka."

With that Jacqueline grabbed a torch hanging on the wall and started the long trek down the steps to the actual vault they had come to see. The deeper they went the colder it got, so much so that they actually started to see slight traces of their breath every time they exhaled. Thankfully, aside from the torch Jacqueline carried, there was another source of light every so often that enabled them to see where each step was.

"How deep does this thing go?"

"Deep enough. The First Emperor himself designed this place to ensure that no one will be able to steal one of the Teigu in the Empire's possession." said Jacqueline before her left foot hit carpet and she came to a halt, Kahfka stopping behind her.

Resting before them was a heavy iron and steel reinforced door that was bolted shut with large cylinders at least 2 feet in diameter. They had arrived...this was the Imperial Vault, the home of every unused Teigu the Empire has in its possession. This was where Demon's Extract had been kept before being taken by Esdeath as her Teigu.

"Welcome, Kahfka, to the Imperial Teigu Vault." said Jacqueline while placing a hand on her hip, the pair taking in the sight of the massive door that was just as old as the Empire itself.

She handed the torch to her and approached the door, grabbing onto a large wheel built into its surface that connected to a series of gears and cogs that when turned would retract the iron bars keeping it sealed. It took some effort and a few grunts, but after a strenuous first turn the wheel finally lost its tension and began to rotate easily. The clanking of the cogs inside its frame told them that the ancient cylinders they were connected to were getting pulled back into the door, and soon enough a deafening series of clicks echoed out from the door itself signalling its unlocking.

Jacqueline grabbed the handle welded to the left side of the door and pulled, the heavy iron creaking as she took one step back at a time to open it. A rush of air came out from behind the vault door when the crack was wide enough and they coughed, Jacqueline pausing to cover her mouth and wait for the dust to settle before she continued.

Once the door was finally opened wide enough for them to pass through, she motioned for the torch and Kahfka handed it back to her as they stepped into the Imperial Vault and looked around. There wasn't really much to see considering the entire inside was pitch black.

"Let there be light…" murmured Jacqueline as she felt around in the dark and found a large boiler, its metal grate open.

She tossed the torch inside and quickly shut the door, the flaming stick lighting the charcoal inside on fire and creating a soft orange glow. A loud metallic groan was heard from the device and a few seconds later the room lit up when lamps hanging from the ceiling turned on, allowing them to see everything around them.

"Whoa…" said Kahfka in awe as she looked around the circular room at all of the weapons, both familiar and unique in design, arranged on either racks, tables or hanging on the walls themselves.

She noticed a lit up gated-off portion of the wall and walked over, Jacqueline following behind her and grinning when she recognized it.

"Ah, this is where Demon's Extract was kept before Esdeath took it on as hers." she stated before she motioned to the rest of the room with a hand. "Every Teigu the Empire either currently has or formerly possessed has a spot in the vault. So all we have to do is look around, and we should discover the location of our nature-using Teigu."

"Wait, if every Teigu has a spot in here...where was yours kept?" asked Kahfka, the Great General looking back at her and chuckling softly.

"Follow me."

She led her through the maze of tables and weapons until she arrived at the wall facing opposite the place where Demon's Extract used to lie, her smile disappearing when she pointed at a much more reinforced cage built into the rock and stone, with thicker bars and even some locks and chains sitting in a jumbled mess on the floor next to it.

Kahfka instantly got a chill up her spine when she realized the purpose of these items. The cage used to contain Devil's Heart wasn't like the one for Demon's Extract, where it was solely used as a storage area, this one was built to keep something from getting out.

" _But why would they put so much effort into keeping a simple heart behind bars and locked chains?_ " she thought to herself before Jacqueline crossed her arms and sighed.

"Kahfka, I want to ask you a question."

"What is it?" she asked, the Great General cracking open an eye and looking right at her.

"Do you know the reason why Demon's Extract was locked away down here?"

Kahfka thought for a moment but she shook her head, Jacqueline turning and resting her back against the wall as she opened both of her eyes again and glared down at the floor.

"It was sealed off because it posed a great danger to anyone who would try to utilize it. You experienced it for yourself, the voices in your head and such. The people who tried to drink the lifeblood Demon's Extract is made out of ended up going insane, so as a result it was locked away until Esdeath came and took it. You were able to master the Teigu because you had a stronger will then it."

"But what does this have to do with your Teigu?" questioned Kahfka to try and figure out the correlation between the two Teigu. "Was Devil's Heart a threat to people as well?"

Jacqueline nodded and she placed a hand gingerly on the skin directly above where the synthetic heart rested inside of her, beating alongside her own heart.

"Yes, it was. Even more so than Demon's Extract because of what it would do to someone if they weren't compatible with the Teigu." she said, her gaze moving up from her feet and back to Kahfka. "Unlike Demon's Extract, where it makes the people who aren't compatible with it go insane...Devil's Heart kills them by absorbing every last drop of blood inside of them."

Kahfka gagged a little and she turned away, the images of such a gruesome death appearing in her mind causing her stomach to do somersaults. After a few moments of dedicating herself to keeping her lunch down and recovering somewhat from the initial shock, she returned to her full height and looked at the cage where the Teigu used to reside.

"That sounds horrible…"

"It's not as bad as you think. Being killed by the Teigu happens fairly quickly...so I've been told. The worst part was what came after it was inside of me…" said Jacqueline with a shiver, Kahfka becoming astonished again at the unorthodox reaction from the normally fearless Great General.

"It shouldn't have been too bad, right? I mean, you just had it surgically implanted into you, right?" asked Kahfka, her curiosity getting the best of her again and driving on the conversation.

Jacqueline looked at her again and developed a disgruntled look as she pointed at the tattoo on Kahfka's left thigh, saying, "Let's just say what you had to go through to conquer Demon's Extract pales in comparison to what Devil's Heart did to me."

 **\- Imperial Vault -**

 **\- Two Years Prior -**

"Pick any one that interests you." said Honest with a smile as he stepped aside to allow Jacqueline into the Teigu vault, the young General, only being nineteen years old, glancing around the room and raising an eyebrow as she approached a strange-looking set of knifes resting on a velvet pillow.

The Prime Minister watched in silence as she picked up one of the golden knives and tested its weight in her grasp, but after a few seconds she slowly shook her head and put it back where it belonged alongside its sister. She moved on to another table of Teigu and Honest rolled his eyes when she again denied another weapon, her pickiness reminding him of another certain General he had taken to the vault before.

" _She's exactly like her old superior…_ " he thought with a light chuckle.

Jacqueline brought her gaze up and instantly felt something come from a cage built into the wall a couple of feet next to her, her head turning towards it and finding a strange looking device contained inside behind the large bars and locked chains.

"What's this one?" she asked, Honest glancing over at the cage and quickly walking over to stand in her way.

"That one is off-limits, unfortunately." he said, but his words fell on deaf ears as she moved past him and placed a hand on the chains, the object inside revealed to be a synthetic heart.

When he saw that she was intent on not moving away, Honest sighed and turned to face her again with his arms behind his back, "If you must know, that Teigu is named Demonic Savagery: Devil's Heart. It was forged from the heart of a Super-class Danger Beast that craved...human blood…"

He shuddered somewhat after saying that and waited for Jacqueline's response, but he was instead given silence. She was focused entirely on the heart resting on a small pedestal inside of the cage and the vibe it was giving off. For some reason, it felt as if the heart itself was talking to her, whispering into her ear the desire to take it on as her own.

"However, like I stated previously, it's off-limits because of its highly dangerous nature. You should consider finding another Teigu if you value your life."

"What does it do…?" asked Jacqueline without taking her eyes off the heart, Honest sighing again as he shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

"Apparently, if one _is_ compatible with the Teigu, it will grant them the Danger Beast's ability to manipulate the growth of their bone structure." he replied, Jacqueline's lips quivering upward into a smile as she leaned in closer towards the Teigu.

"This heart...I can hear it whispering to me..." she murmured under her breath, her head slowly turning until she was looking back at the Prime Minister. "It wants me to use it...it's been so long since it was last used."

"I see…" said Honest before he walked over to a glass cabinet and reached inside for a key hanging on a hook inside.

He went back over to where she and the cage were and inserted the metal key into the first of many locks keeping the cage chained shut, a click resonating out from within after he turned the key to the right. Jacqueline watched eagerly as he unlocked the remaining five and took off the chains, tossing them to the side before he took a couple of steps back to give her room.

She grasped onto each barred door of the cage and opened it, her hand going in afterwards to retrieve Devil's Heart and hold it. It felt oddly warm to the touch, and the faint whispering noise she was hearing seemed to get louder now that she was actually holding the Teigu.

Honest led her out from the vault and back to the surface, where she was taken to the capital's hospital to have Devil's Heart surgically implanted into her. Once she was admitted into a room alongside a couple of doctors, stripped naked and given a patient's nightgown she was told to lay down on the operating table and wait.

"Good luck, General." said Honest before he stepped outside the room to wait for the operation's completion, Jacqueline letting out a deep breath and closing her eyes.

A few minutes later three doctors and a nursed prepped for surgery stepped into the room, with the latter holding a metal box that undoubtedly contained Devil's Heart. The nurse set it down on a rolling table a close by to the table and went over to monitor the equipment while the three doctors stood by Jacqueline's right with their gloves held up.

"Are you ready to proceed?" asked one of them, Jacqueline nodding. "Very well, let us be-"

He was cut off when a loud thumping noise was heard from somewhere in the room. They all waited in utter silence and out of nowhere, the same sound repeated itself, only louder then the first time. Slowly the nurse looked at the metal box that contained the Teigu and watched it with wide eyes when the sound repeated itself for a third time.

It was coming from the box, and the sound, now that it was heard three times in a row, was unmistakeable to the four people in the room. It was that of a beating heart...and it only took them a second to realize that it was actually Devil's Heart _itself_ that was beating. Jacqueline stared at the nurse as she slowly crept over to the box and opened it, the three doctors and her all gasping when they saw the heart move and give off the same noise once again.

Suddenly the Teigu let out an ear-piercing screech that caused them all to cover their ears and yell out in pain. Jacqueline however said nothing when the heart literally _leaped_ out of the small box with the assistance of the small metallic wires protruding out from one of its ventricles and landed square in the center of her chest.

The doctors and nurse, who by now had recovered from the shrill the heart gave off, turned and were left paralyzed in utter horror not when Jacqueline screamed at the top of her lungs, but when they witnessed Devil's Heart begin to tear open her flesh right next to where her heart was and began to burrow down into her, spraying blood and skin everywhere like a frenzied animal devouring its prey. As soon as it began, however, it ended when the heart nestled itself in between a grouping of veins and began to rip them apart, connecting them to itself and her original heart to allow blood to begin pumping through it and determine if she would live or die.

After a few moments of listening to the steady beating of the second heart inside of the General, she gasped when the bloody skin surrounding Devil's Heart began to give off some steam and, to her shock, start to regenerate itself until finally the wound vanished entirely. That's when she heard the voice she had heard earlier speak directly to her in the back of her head.

" _Their blood...I want their blood! Kill them! Kill, kill, kill!_ "

Without saying a word, Jacqueline stood up from the operating table and set herself down beside it, the three doctors and nurse watching as she cocked her head to the right and glared at them with wide eyes. Her lips curled upward into a psychotic smile and to their horror, the skin at her shoulders, forearms and the palms of her hands split open to allow several bone protrusions sharpened to a lethal point to slide out.

Then she started to speak.

"Don't worry...this won't hurt at all..." she murmured with a giggle as she started to walk towards the four medical staff members, their terrified expressions only making her smile widen.

Meanwhile outside in the hallway Honest was keeping himself occupied by twirling his thumbs around while he sat down in a chair close by before, all of a sudden, a blood-curdling scream came out from the room Jacqueline was in. The man standing beside him dressed in a suit vest and a top hat was also startled by the scream and he ran to the door first, the Prime Minister right behind him as he flung it open and stepped inside.

What they came to was an absolute horror show, with blood splattered all over the walls, the equipment and the operating table. And standing in the center of it all, with the dead and horribly mutilated corpses of the three doctors and nurses drowning in blood at her feet, was Jacqueline herself.

Her arms were hanging limp at her sides, the sharpened bone rods sticking out of her palms covered in the juices of the people she had murdered, and she was silently giggling to herself as a result of the influence Devil's Heart was having over her mind. The man in the top hat, uncaring of what should happen to him, approached the unstable General and placed both hands on her shoulders.

"Jacqueline, wake up." he said, the woman glancing up at him with wide eyes and freezing when she saw the man's eyes and the smile he wore. "Remember why you're doing this."

"No...I want...I want to kill…" she murmured, the man moving his hands from her shoulders to cup her cheeks and star her directly into the eyes.

"Don't let it control you. You're tougher then that. You still have something to do, remember?"

She blinked a few times and, slowly burt surely, the bones sticking out of her body retracted back behind her skin and vanished, her insane smile being the next thing to go.

"I-Inquisitor...I…" she stuttered before the man wrapped his arms around her and hugged her tightly, Jacqueline burrowing her head into his shoulder and shuddering, the intoxicating bloodlust of Devil's Heart fading away now that she had been brought back to normal.

 **\- Present Day -**

"It...it really did that?" asked Kahfka nervously, the Great General nodding with a grim look on her face as she lowered her hand from her chest and walked away from the cage.

"Now with that out of the way, let's move on to finding the Teigu we came down here to search for." she said, her smile returning once again as she examined the weapons arranged around them for something that could relate to what she had read.

Kahfka continued her own search by looking at the weapons organized on the walls of the room, her eyes scanning every single one until she stopped before a wall section that didn't seem to fit in. She ran her hand along its surface and found that by pressing on it it moved ever-so-slightly, meaning that there was a possibility of it being capable of opening.

"Find anything?" asked Jacqueline over her shoulder.

"Yeah, I may have found a secret room over here." she replied, Jacqueline quickly jogging over to where she was to help in finding the secret switch or button that would open the wall section.

Finally, when she ran her hand over the right side of the wall she felt a slight bump in its smooth surface and grinned, pressing it with her thumb and stepping back when the wall shifted backwards and slid to the side.

"Good job, Kahfka." said Jacqueline with a smile as she walked inside, Kahfka blushing at the compliment before following her.

Within the separate room was something either of them had expected to see. Printed on the wall in order were the numbers two through six, with the number one printed in gold above them all, and surprisingly there were six individual holding racks built into the wall underneath each number.

All of them were empty except for one. Underneath the number three was a very tall figure, standing at least seven feet tall, with its head hanging low and its arms hanging limp at its side. Jacqueline guessed by its physique that the figure was undoubtedly male, and when they got closer she found that it was dressed in a long black, green and maroon trench coat with a fairly large collar, baggy purple pants, boots, clawed gloves and covering the entirety of its head was a horned helmet possessing a white mask.

Overall his appearance was similar to that of a demon, this personna only being exemplified due to the large spear-like weapon hanging on the wall behind it.

"Is this that nature Teigu?" asked Kahfka in almost a whisper as they approached the format being and looked up at its white face, a pair of black eyeholes staring back at them.

"I guess we'll be finding out shortly." replied Jacqueline as she crossed her arms and recalled the information needed to activate the humanoid Teigu.

"Nature's Wrath: Dreivas, activate." she stated clearly and with authority, Kahfka jumping when the tall figure suddenly jerked and a pair of orange eyes came into existence within the black eyeholes.

Before either could react the figure's right hand shot up and slammed into Jacqueline's throat, knocking the wind out of her, and lifted her up into the air. Kahfka cringed when she heard the Great General's neck snap and in a flash she was right on top of the figure, her feet striking the man directly in the jaw and sending him flying back into the wall. Jacqueline coughed up blood as a result of her throat getting crushed and she rested on her knees for a few seconds to allow her Teigu to heal the fatal injury while Kahfka unleashed her rage upon the attacker.

"Kalt Grausamkeit!" she bellowed as she enveloped her arm in ice and threw it forward, a massive spear shooting out from it as fast as a bullet and piercing right through the humanoid Teigu's chest.

The sheer force and penetrating power of the spear was so strong it burst out of his back and pinned him to the wall, Kahfka grinning menacingly as she broke her arm out of the ice spear and manifested a sword in her hand.

"It's okay Kahfka, I'm fine." spoke up Jaqueline after she recovered her speech capabilities, Kahfka's anger instantly vanishing.

She nodded and dispersed the ice sword in her hand before going to help her back to her feet so they could both confront the hostile Teigu that had so ruthlessly attacked Jacqueline.

"Dreivas, correct? Why did you attack me?" asked Jacqueline with a scowl as they approached the humanoid Teigu without fear of being attacked again since he was still pinned to the wall.

"You were a strong opponent, my sensors told me this. I wanted to see If they were correct in their assessment." replied Dreivas in a deep, gravelly voice.

"Sensors? Are you not a Biological-type Teigu?" asked Kahfka, since she just noticed that even though she had impaled him with her ice he was secreting blood at all.

"No, I'm not." replied Dreivas before, to their shock, he rammed his fist into the ice spear and shattered it completely, allowing him to drop onto his feet and take in a deep breath.

Kahfka and Jacqueline were both thrown for another loop when, instead of blood and guts, they saw that the Teigu contained no flesh or organs whatsoever. Instead, it was all wiring and machinery that Kahfka had pierced through with her ice, and to make it even more interesting it began to self-repair itself just like a Biological-type Teigu would.

When the hole had been filled and Dreivas stretched himself out to make sure everything was in proper working condition he casually walked over to where he was formerly resting and grabbed his weapon from the rack on the wall.

"I'm a specially created Teigu called a Mechanical-type due to the fact we are entirely machine, but at the same time we have the ability to self-repair ourselves if damaged similar to a Biological-type, if you haven't noticed already." stated Dreivas matter-of-factly, the Teigu's rudeness causing Kahfka to grind her teeth together.

"You said we, does that mean there are more of you?" asked Jacqueline after ignoring his rude remark.

"Yes, but only one other. I can't quite remember its name, however. What I do know though is that it's exceptionally powerful, since it acted as the Emperor's personal guard. Speaking of the Emperor, how is that fool of a ruler?"

Jacqueline glanced over at Kahfka and grinned before she motioned to the vault outside with her hand, "Come, Dreivas, we have much to discuss."

 **\- Fortress Shisuikan -**

 **\- Three Hours Later -**

The mighty Shisuikan, the fabled impregnable fortress that protected the Imperial Capital from attack by foreign forces. Unfortunately for its reputation, when Budo was killed the fortress was easily overtaken by the Revolutionary Army and transformed into their forward command base to invade the capital. It was a major victory for the revolution as a whole, but its hopes and dreams of toppling the corrupt regime were shot when the new Great General and her newest subordinate laid waste to the forces stationed there, literally staining the fortress walls red.

Afterwards, a special division within the Imperial Military officially named the Surprise and Attack Division that was given the nickname "Hellraisers" for their tactics that blend overwhelming power with guerrilla warfare, attacking the enemy from all sides with hit and run tactics designed to wear an enemy down little by little until they totally collapse from the pressure.

Their leader was infamously known throughout the Empire for these tactics by many names, most notably being "Devil Hound" and "Hell's Warden", and for his military accomplishments that rival even those of Esdeath he was given the nickname "Supreme Soldier".

But for the last seven months, the Hellraisers have been sitting within the Shisuikan practically doing nothing. Thankfully for them and the Lieutenant Colonel in charge of the special division, however, they were finally given the chance to get back into the action once an officer received a letter from the Imperial Capital.

Only a glance at who the letter was from was enough to give the soldier a hint about the information inside.

"Lieutenant Colonel, you've gotten a message from the Great General." spoke the man when he walked into an office situated at the top of the highest tower of the fortress.

Standing before a set of floor-to-ceiling glass panels with his arms behind his back was the Lieutenant Colonel himself, his posture and the very air around him radiating absolute authority.

Those who have met and fought alongside him would know why he earned the nickname "Supreme Soldier". He demanded the utmost respect from the men beneath him, but he was also fair and just, reprimanding then when they needed it and congratulating them upon success. He was charismatic and inspired great courage among his men, desiring to lead them from the front lines instead of behind like a coward.

On the battlefield against his enemies, however...it was a completely different story.

When presented with a mission, the Lieutenant Colonel becomes utterly focused, doing everything in his power to ensure it is completed. It's almost as if he exterminates any emotions, characteristics or education that do not contribute to the swift execution of his duties.

To his enemies, he is a ruthless and vicious opponent in any confrontation. Another factor is due to his various combat achievements across a short yet impressive five year tenure within the Imperial Military, encountering many life-threatening situations and gaining all sorts of wounds and scars as a result, he's become practically immune to the feeling of pain.

The soldier approached the Lieutenant Colonel after saluting and handed over the sealed parchment to him. He grasped it in his hand and opened it up, the soldier waiting patiently a few steps behind him while he read the letter inside top to bottom.

After finishing the Lieutenant Colonel smirked and crumpled up the paper, a sigh escaping his lips. "Seems we'll be heading out to the Western Nations while the Great General takes her army to combat the Eastern Nation's army."

The Lieutenant Colonel strode over to the office desk the room had and picked up a gas mask, his other hand grabbing a flexible oxygen tube hanging from a filtration device he had on a belt he wore over a heavy long coat and connecting it to the mask. He slipped it on over his head and sealed it with a hiss, the next thing he would put on being armored gloves and a bowl-shaped metal helmet.

"Go ahead and send a message back to the Great General. That will be all, soldier." said the Lieutenant Colonel with a heavy breath after adjusting his gloves.

"Yes sir!" responded the soldier before he swiftly left the office.

The Lieutenant Colonel, after a few minutes of making sure the filtration device was working properly he walked over to the room exit and bent down slightly, his fingers wrapping tightly around the handle of a spear-type weapon leaning against the doorframe.

" _I wonder how the flames of war will change this time around…_ " he thought with a chuckle before he left the office to inform his men of their departure.

It was going to be a long journey for them all, and he wanted to get there as quickly as possible.


	26. Westward Bound

A/N Yes, just how powerful is the Inquisitor...that is a question that will be answered in time. Right now, what we have to worry about is just what will the Jaegers do upon making landfall. And what of Magress, the mysterious armored character who has become a thorn in the side of the Empire? I wonder who he is, and what his volitions are? Also, on another note, the Mechanical-type Teigu **Nature's Wrath: Dreivas** , introduced last chapter, has been put up on the wiki. Go and check him out when you get a chance. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 25 - Westward Bound**

"There it is...the Eastern Coast of the Empire."

Tatsumi and Esdeath's expressions soured when the clouds parted and they both had a clear line of sight on the approaching coastline they had fled from seven months prior. They weren't disgruntled about this fact, however...it was because the Empire had known they were coming and had taken the precautionary steps to prepare for their arrival. The beach had been terraformed to allow for the construction of anti-troop defenses such as barbed wire and trenches had been dug into the dirt resting where the treeline of the forest bordering the beach had once been.

They had even called in the entire Imperial Navy to act as a buffer and first line of defense against the approaching enemy, and they had taken the extra measure to add on extra armor plating to the wooden ships to protect themselves.

They however weren't going to deal with just ground troops. The Empire had no idea just how powerful the Kingdom of Straelka's military was, and they would be contesting with the full might of the Royal Air Suppression Forces and the armored tanks that would be storming the beaches alongside their human companions.

"Captain, give the order to the rest of the airships to raise their altitudes and climb above the cloud layer. When you're done with that, establish a line of communications with the ground forces to tell us when we are directly over the enemy forces." spoke Camilla with authority, the Airship Captain nodding as he reached for a microphone.

He spoke quickly and clearly into the device and a few moments later the entire bridge lurched upwards when the airship began to ascend into the dark grey clouds blanketing the entire coast. When their massive hulls were completely hidden they slowed to a crawl and continued moving forward, the captain maintaining a line to one of the transport ships down below in order to know how close they were to their targets.

"Fifty meters to target." spoke a voice through the microphone, the captain giving the order to the other crew members within the bridge to open the bomb bay doors.

"What are you going to do?" asked Wave, Camilla glancing back at him over her shoulder and winking.

"Just wait and see."

Wave looked down at Chelsea and when she shrugged he sighed and settled on doing exactly what the Princess had said. Another few passed and the voice informed the captain that the airships were twenty meters to their target, which some were already beginning to assume would be the Imperial Navy.

"Airship fleet, you are directly over the target zone. You may attack when ready. Once the initial bombardment has been completed, we will begin our assault on the beach."

"Roger. Commencing thunder now. Drop ten bombs each, then close bay doors!" ordered the Airship Captain to their allies, the other R.A.S.F airships opening their bomb bay doors.

Down on the beaches, the Imperial soldiers holed up in their trenches with either their rifles or their spears and swords were anxiously awaiting the arrival of the enemy force they had been sent here to fight against. They could clearly see the massive fleet approaching the coast, and the sheer amount of ships coming their way was making them shake in their boots.

They had no idea that hell was going to rain down on them from above. Slowly they began to hear a slight whistling noise, and as the seconds ticked by the sound got louder and louder. Some looked at one another in utter confusion, but it became pretty clear what the source was when a massive explosion of fire and smoke encompass a portion of the beach, eradicating their defenses and incinerating any soldiers caught in the blast.

Soon the entire beach was set ablaze by the firebombs dropped from the hidden airships hovering above, the Imperial soldiers incapable of doing anything to combat or protect themselves from them. It was a total slaughter, and once the heavily armored transport ships of the Royal Navy got close they attacked the Imperial Navy by ramming into their ships with their pointed bows.

Their weak wooden frames even with the extra protection couldn't withstand the sheer power of their iron warships and easily broke away, allowing the Royal Navy to pierce through their lines and reach the beach to begin unloading their troops when the aerial bombardment stopped.

When the explosions stopped Camilla ordered the Airship Captain to bring the craft back down from the clouds with the rest of the airships. Now with a clear view over the entire beach, Tatsumi, Esdeath and the rest of the Jaegers had a front row seat to the carnage their firebombs had caused.

"Holy shit…" murmured Tatsumi in total shock as he looked down at the blackened and charred sand of the beach below, the defenses the Empire had built turned to dust.

"Such destructive power. I never would've imagined another nation would be able to construct weapons like this." murmured Esdeath, who was awed by the display of military strength.

"Come on guys, let's get you down to the ground." said Camilla with a smile as she turned away from the windows and walked out of the bridge, Solomon and the Jaegers following her.

She took them through the interior of the airship and down a few flights of stairs until they arrived down in the last place they would expect a way down to be. The doors slid open and Camilla strided into the bomb bay, a smile on her face while the Jaegers developed worrisome looks at the sight of the bombs hanging above them on mechanized racks. She noticed their apprehension and she laughed after walking over to a lever jutting out of the ground.

"Don't worry, the bombs don't activate until they're dropped, so we're perfectly fine in here."

"But _why_ are we in here?" asked Chelsea.

"Each airship also comes equipped with a rapid-descent rappel system in case the crew needs to get out quickly. Here we'll use it to get you guys to the ground." stated Solomon before he walked over to where Camilla stood and wrapped an arm around her.

"Wait, you're not coming with us? Why?"

"No, I'm going to stay with Camilla if that's okay with you all. Since Wilhelm isn't here I'm the most viable replacement for him. However I did take the liberty of making these for you." he replied before tossing a large satchel over to them.

Tatsumi caught it and opened the flap to see its contents, Esdeath, Wave, Run and Chelsea looking over his shoulder to get a glimpse as well. There were at least ten corked bottles of a dark red liquid inside, and once Esdeath pulled one out and looked at it more closely did they realize what it was.

The red liquid was in fact Solomon's phoenix blood, the very same blood he used to fix Wave's broken back and completely regenerate Najenda's lost arm and eye.

When Tatsumi looked back at Solomon with a look of surprise on his face, Solomon chuckled, "Take them and keep them safe. It may be a little morbid, but I had a bad feeling you'll be needing them."

"Thank you."

Tatsumi slung the satchel over his shoulder and he gave a nod to Camilla for her to open the bomb bay doors, the Princess grabbing the release lever and pulling it. A rush of air swept inside when the large metal doors separated and they approached the edge, seeing that the airship was close enough to the ground that it wouldn't be a long trip down. A secondary machine lowered itself down from the ceiling after a bomb rack moved aside and with five loud shots of compressed steam, a steel cable for each of them was launched down at the beach.

Once Solomon confirmed that the cables at imbedded their sharpened tips into the sandy ground he gave a thumbs up to Camilla, who went to a control panel built into the floor next to the lever and pressed a series of buttons. Esdeath looked up and saw five winches roll down the cables and come to a halt at their height, each possessing two handles for a person to hold on to.

"Please keep your hands and feet in at all times! I hope you enjoy the ride!" said Solomon with a grin as they grabbed onto the handles and held on tightly.

Wave jumped off the edge first and the locking mechanism on the winch gave away, allowing for the wheels to slide down the cable and carry him down to the ground. The rest of the Jaegers followed him down and the air rushed past their faces as they rapidly descended towards the beach. When they neared the ground they braced themselves and hit the sand with both feet, the impact jarring them slightly, but otherwise they were completely fine.

"Well, that was certainly interesting." said Run as he dusted himself off, Chelsea pushing aside some loose strands of her hair back behind her ear.

"So, where to now?" she asked before a line of Straelkan soldiers joined by several caterpillar tanks moved past them.

"We need to find Najenda and the others, first and foremost. Then, after we meet up with them, I suggest we head to the Western Nations first to try and see if we can free them from their plight. If we're going to take on the capital with Jacqueline as the Great General, we're gonna need all the help we can get." said Tatsumi, Esdeath nodding in agreement as she adjusted her rapier sheath and belt.

"Most definitely. Najenda and Night Raid will know everything that's happened in the seven months we were gone, so it's imperative we find them first."

Before they could act and begin their search however, a familiar presence made itself known and they all turned to the tree line when a flash of blonde emerged from the leaves.

"Thankfully, you guys won't have to." said the owner of the blonde hair as she stepped out from behind a tree.

"Leone!" exclaimed Chelsea happily while the lioness of Night Raid walked down to the beach to meet them, Tatsumi grinning at the sight of his friend.

He shared a quick hug with her, Esdeath doing the same, before he asked, "Where's everyone else?"

"I'll take you to them." replied Leone with a grin before turning towards the forest, the Jaegers following behind her.

"We would've all come, but it was too dangerous."

"What do you mean by that?" asked Wave.

Leone dropped her grin and her entire demeanor changed, the Jaeger's question bringing up another side of her that she was hoping to keep under wraps until they had arrived at their destination. She glanced back over her shoulder at them and sighed, her reaction already telling them that all had not been well.

"It hasn't been so great while you guys were gone. Actually, the state of the Empire has gotten worse. Jacqueline's grip on the military and the nation as a whole is forcing us to stay in the shadows all the time, since she has eyes and ears everywhere. That's why there were Imperial soldiers dug in here."

"She knew that were were coming. That means there was someone else beside that scientist who was there in Straelka." said Run after putting the pieces together, Leone nodding.

"Exactly. And I already suspect that there was someone here who watched the entire attack and confirmed your arrival. They would already have left by now too, so we don't have much time. Come on."

 **\- Imperial Training Grounds, Imperial Capital -**

 **\- The Next Day, 12:34 p.m -**

Jacqueline and Kahfka had been at the Imperial Training ground for the past week and a half, personally guiding the training of her army, formerly Esdeath's army, to become an even more formidable fighting force then before. There were those who proved to be unable to exceed her expectations and died during the grueling training practices she put into them, but they were few in number.

As a whole, she was pleased with the results of their efforts and, as a reward, she was on her way to present her assembled soldiers something *special.

"So what are you going to give them?" asked Kahfka as they rounded a corner inside the training grounds' storage facility and auxiliary barracks on their way to the training field.

Jacqueline smirked a little as she flipped back a lock of hair. "You'll have to wait and see."

"No fair, I want to know now." replied Kahfka with a huff, her pouty expression causing Jacqueline to giggle.

She stopped and turned around to place a finger up against Kahfka's lips, the former assassin's eyes widening in surprise.

"Give me attitude like that again and you won't receive _your_ reward for helping me tonight." she said with a mischievous grin and a wink.

Kahfka nodded her head and she removed her finger, the pair resuming their stroll to the training field where the Inquisitor had gathered her army and had ordered them to wait for her arrival. They emerged out from the building and were met by the Inquisitor himself, who led them to the training field.

Her army remained dead silent as she made her way to the front of their lines and came to an abrupt halt, turning briskly towards them and observing them intently. Kahfka and the Inquisitor stood on either side of her with their hands behind their back and waited for her to start talking along with the rest of the soldiers standing before her.

"Well, it's been a long and difficult week and half, but I think you are all finally ready. You've met and exceeded my expectations, which only solidifies your reputation as Esdeath's _former_ army. As a token of my appreciation, you will all receive new uniforms and weapons courtesy of myself and the Prime Minister." she announced with a smile, her soldiers developing shocked expressions as they whispered among themselves excitedly.

"All I ask from you is this...when you see your former General on the field of battle, do not show fear or apprehension. Do not show empathy. She is a traitor to the Empire and will be treated as such, so I expect all of you to fight her without hesitation. Understood?"

"Yes Ma'am!" they replied in unison, the Great General's evil smile widening at their response.

The Inquisitor raised a hand and snapped his fingers, a few moments passing before several Imperial Guards leading horse-drawn carriages appeared, each with large crates filled to the brim with her army's new equipment. The new uniforms they were getting had been constructed out of a lightweight yet highly durable thread that was strong enough to stop bullets in their testing, and instead of the light grey color the typical Imperial Army soldier's uniform had, these were colored pitch black. The helmets were also made of a stronger material then their previous ones and also possessed a more devilish appearance, with horns emerging out from the top and small fangs protruding from front edge.

With her job done, Jacqueline instructed the Inquisitor to remain and direct the distribution of the new gear to her soldiers while she and Kahfka would return to the Reconditioning Department to finish up final preparations before they would leave to meet the Straelkan army head-on. However, that wasn't the *only reason they were leaving, even the Inquisitor knew that. But he didn't say anything and instead bid them farewell before returning his attention to the task at hand, Jacqueline and Kahfka taking their leave afterwards.

It took them under ten minutes to return to the Reconditioning Department and they descended back into the domain of torture, Jacqueline's influence on Kahkfa transforming her to the point the screams of agony of the people unfortunate enough to end up inside sounded like music to her ears.

"I'm going to take a shower, if that's okay with you. I don't want to wait until I get back to my apartment." said Kahfka as soon as she walked through the door into Jacqueline's personal chamber, the Great General nodding before she directed her to where the shower was located in the wall.

Jacqueline opened another portion of the wall that opened up into a bedroom where she would sleep and waited for a few seconds, the sound of the shower turning on telling her that Kahfka had just stepped inside. That was when a devilish grin spread across her face and she quickly scurried around, getting the room ready for when Kahfka would eventually walk in. Five minutes passed by and the shower turned off, Kahfka walking out from the tiled enclosure whilst drying her hair with a towel.

She saw the other opening and strolled over, peering inside and freezing in shock at what she saw.

"Hello, Kahfka, come in." spoke Jacqueline from her position on the bed, Kahfka blinking a few times to make sure what she was seeing was real.

Jacqueline was sitting on the bed with her legs folded up beneath her and her arms resting in her lap, but the shocking part was that she was completely naked save for a couple of large ribbons wrapped around her covering the important areas. And even though she had already seen her lover stark naked, the way she was dressed right now was causing her body to feel hot and bothered.

"Well, aren't you going to come receive your reward…?" asked Jacqueline lustfully as she beckoned her over with her finger.

Kahfka's cheeks turned bright red before she slowly walked over to the bed and climbed onto the sheets, Jacqueline lowering herself onto her back to give her unrestricted access. Kahfka reached for the knot holding the ribbons together tightly over her breasts and pulled lightly, the fabric loosening and coming apart until finally it came undone and freed them from their confinement. From there the rest of the ribbons came off without any problems and Kahfka tossed them to the side, their purpose now fulfilled.

Jacqueline gasped when she started to flick her tongue softly over her left nipple and play with the other, a smile appearing soon afterwards.

"Do you like your reward?" she asked, Kahfka pausing for a moment to look up and smile.

"It's been a week and a half since we last had time like this to ourselves...so of course I do." she replied before she kissed Jacqueline, their tongues swirling around each other and mixing their saliva together.

The Great General decided that she wasn't going to allow her lover to have all the fun any longer, so while Kahfka was still preoccupied with their kids she slipped her hand underneath her and feel her way to her legs, her index finger and ring finger doing the job of spreading apart the lips of her sex so that she could slide her middle finger in without any resistance.

Kahfka moaned and split her lips from Jacqueline's, the feeling of her finger massaging her inner walls causing her mind to go blank.

"No...I have an idea…" she said through heavy breaths before picking herself up and maneuvering turning herself around.

The bed depressed around Jacqueline's neck when Kahfka placed her knees just above her shoulders and she was left gazing in awe up at Kahfka's wet sex, which was hovering just a few inches above her face.

"Please…" she pleaded as she lowered her hips down and gasped when she felt Jacqueline's breath against her folds.

"You naughty girl…" murmured Jacqueline with a smile before she leaned up and lightly ran her tongue along her entrance.

Kahfka bit her her lip and suppressed a moan as chills went up and down her spine, the unorthodox feeling of pleasure opening up a whole new world to her. Jacqueline licked her again and she clenched her fists, a tiny squeal escaping past her lips. Her eyes looked down and she saw Jacqueline spread her own legs apart beneath her as if she was inviting her to do the same thing.

"Do it to me too..." said Jacqueline to answer her unasked question before she stuck her tongue out and wriggled it past her folds, drenching her insides with her saliva.

"Fuck…that feels...so good…" moaned Kahfka before she too leaned forward and pressed her lips against Jacqueline's sopping wet private area to kiss it.

She gasped and let out a moan, Kahfka continuing on with her tongue past her entrance and feeling all throughout her insides. Her exploration was sending waves of pleasure coursing through Jacqueline's veins, which in turn spurred her on to do the same to Kahfka and make it even more intense for her. Their passion and love for one another was what drove them, the bond they shared unbreakable.

This is what would allow them to be a nigh unstoppable fighting force on the battlefield.

 **\- Southern Lands of the Empire -**

 **\- Six Hours Later -**

"It's over here, follow me!" exclaimed Leone as she directed her horse around a large rocky outcropping, the Jaegers following close behind her since to their right they had a steep cliff face and on their left was a sheer drop that easily surpassed a thousand feet.

"I think I'm going to be sick…" muttered Wave after he looked over the edge and held back some bile, Chelsea grinning at his reaction.

"Stop being such a wuss." she said, her response causing the former sailor to glare back at her and slip her the finger when no one was looking.

"So why such a remote location Leone?" asked Tatsumi as he observed the surrounding landscape for a few moments before figuring out the answer for himself. "Oh wait, duh, being assassins and enemies of the Empire kinda calls for it."

"Yeah...anyways how was it in the Eastern Nation? Anything interesting happen?" asked Leone after they had all traversed the perilous bend.

"Well, it was quite pleasant actually. Turns out Solomon used to live there and he was, quote unquote "friends" with the Princess, and we got to stay in the Royal Palace there. Oh, and also someone tried to assassinate us too." stated Run casually, Leone's head wrenching back over her shoulder with a look of shock on her face.

"Wait, what?! Seriously?"

"It was the scientist there, name was Anton. He was sent there by Jacqueline to kill us in our sleep." said Esdeath with a growl. "If that bastard had laid even a finger on Lucena I swear…"

"Lucena? Who's that?" asked Leone, Tatsumi looking at the confusion on her face and chuckling.

"It's our daughter, Leone. I gave birth to a girl, and we named her Lucena." said Esdeath happily, Leone's eyes widening as a grin made its presence known.

"Let me tell you, Leone, she has got to be the most cutest thing ever." began Chelsea as she moved her horse up next to Leone's and started to rant about Lucena and how she got to care for her.

A few minutes passed by and Leone stopped her conversation with Chelsea about Lucena when they came to a large cave opening, the lioness bringing her horse to a halt and dismounting the animal. The Jaegers followed suit and they were led by the Night Raid member into the cave until they arrived at a large pair of doors built into the wall of the cavern.

"This is a secret base the Revolutionary Army built a while back before they abandoned and left it to us so they could take the rest of the Path of Peace to their main headquarters deep within the Southern Territories near the border." she explained before knocking on the door four times, a moment of silence passing by before they opened.

"Well it took you long enough." stated Lubbock with a smirk as he stepped into the doorway and leaned up against the door, Leone rolling her eyes at him. "Hey guys, welcome back."

"Hey Lubbock. Care to let us inside? We have a lot to discuss with Najenda." asked Tatsumi with a nod at his friend, the green-haired assassin stepping aside and holding the door open for them.

"Good luck, she hasn't really been in the best of moods."

"Why's that?" questioned Esdeath, Lubbock glancing at her as he closed the door and locked it tight.

"Well, for starters, her Teigu, Susanoo...he was killed recently. When we were inside the Imperial Capital, we ended up getting caught and even though Najenda used his Trump Card twice, Jacqueline was able to destroy his core. We barely got away with our lives."

 **\- Capital Defensive Wall -**

 **\- Night Fall -**

Jacqueline, Kahfka and the Inquisitor approached the main gates of the Imperial Capital with the seemingly endless columns of her newly equipped soldiers marching in unison behind them. The citizens they had passed by were left utterly speechless at the demonic looking men walking past them, and to be honest they were terrified for the people that would have to fight them. They had no idea though that the people they should be worried about were the three leading the massive army, since their skills combined would be equal in strength to an entire army.

When they arrived at the gate Jacqueline was greeted by an Imperial Soldier she recognized as the man she had sent to the Eastern Coast, and instead of a greeting she was immediately saluted and told of what had occurred there. At first she wasn't surprised at the fact that their forces were decimated by the unrivaled strength of the enemy's military, but when the man told her that the Jaegers were seen among them, her lips curled upward into a smile and she glanced over at the Inquisitor.

"My Inquisitor, your targets have arrived." she stated, the former assassin cracking open an eye and looking at her with a sly grin. "Be a dear and go take care of them for me, will you?"

"Of course, my Mistress. It would be my pleasure." he replied before he gripped the handle for Brahmastra's carrying case tightly and closed his eye again before he leaped up high into the air and up onto the top of the wall.

When he landed her popped his neck and rolled around each of his shoulders, the images of all the Jaegers and members of Night Raid flashing into his mind like a visual novel followed by their strengths and weaknesses.

" _I will not fail you, Jacqueline. That is a promise._ " he thought to himself before he leaped off the wall and disappeared into the forest surrounding the capital.

Jacqueline and Kahfka were about to continue moving out of the city with their army before they both sensed a familiar presence and they looked to the sky, a dark maroon and green blur falling down from above and striking the cobblestone road a few feet away from them. The tall figure stood up to his full height and Jacqueline laid a hand on her hip as he walked over, the grin on her face widening.

"Ah, Dreivas, I was wondering when you would show."

"Shut it, I'm not here to help you two. You both are strong enough without me, so I'm going to help your Inquisitor friend. Farewell." stated the mechanical Teigu harshly before he chased after the Inquisitor, Kahfka glaring at his back as he went with an evil gaze.

"You know, I really despise that...thing." she said with a growl, Jacqueline laughing a little after the Teigu had vanished from view.

"Ah, it's fine. If he gets killed by the Jaegers, it won't be of concern to me. He would've served his purpose."


	27. The One Man Army

A/N Alright enough of the filler chapters, let's get back to the real action. Alright, let me clear my throat so that way I can use my awesome trailer narration voice. Ahem, now that the Jaegers have returned to the Empire after seven months, a meeting with Jacqueline and her forces is inevitable. How will they deal with the mechanical Teigu Dreivas and the Inquisitor? Ha, did you like that? I think I did pretty good. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 26 - The One Man Army**

 **\- Night Raid Secret Hideout -**

Tatsumi and Esdeath opened the door to Najenda's room and quietly stepped inside, the purple haired woman herself sitting a few feet away from them in a chair with her back turned. Just from her body posture they could tell she was still grieving over the loss of Susanoo, who they all had taken a liking to.

"Hey, Najenda." said Tatsumi carefully after Esdeath closed the door, the Night Raid leader hardly moving.

"We heard what happened with Susanoo. I'm sorry, from what I could tell he seemed to be a good person."

"It was bound to happen sooner or later…" murmured Najenda as they sat on either side of her in two other chairs, her eyes coming up to meet with theirs. "How was it in the Eastern Nation?"

"Fine, and it's name is the Kingdom of Straleka." corrected Tatsumi, Najenda nodding. "Solomon was actually from there and long story made short, we got to stay in the Royal Palace."

"Really? Anything else?"

"Turns out our good friend Jacqueline had an ally over there that was ordered to kill us in our sleep along with the rest of the leading figures of Straelka." stated Tatsumi with a scowl, Najenda's eyes widening in surprise. "We didn't find out until it was too late, and the Kaiser and Kaiserin, the rulers of Straelka and Camilla's, she's the princess, parents were killed."

"Damn...and I assume that she was the one that declared war on the Empire?"

Esdeath nod her head and Najenda let out a sigh as she leaned back in her chair. "Well, at least we'll have their help. But with the Western Nations under the Empire's total control and the Revolutionary Army and Path of Peace nearly wiped out…"

"Actually, that's one of the reasons we came to you first. Even though the Straelkan military is strong, with Jacqueline still alive they're going to need all the help they can get."

"What do you mean?" asked Najenda, Tatsumi glancing at Esdeath for her to continue where he left off.

"We're going to liberate the Western Nations. And we're going to need your help to do so."

Najenda was left appalled at the idea of taking on the army currently guarding the Western Nations from Empire control. Esdeath's army was certainly a fearsome fighting force, probably the best in the entire Imperial Military since she had seen them in action, but she had heard horror stories about the Hellraisers and especially their leader, a Lieutenant Colonel who went by the nickname "Hell's Warden". They were infamous throughout the Empire for their blitzkrieg tactics and their overwhelming power, and she had also heard that wherever their Lieutenant Colonel went on the battlefield...there were bound to be scorched corpses left behind.

"Are you sure about that? What about Jacqueline?" she asked, Tatsumi bringing his arms back behind his head and leaning back.

"Solomon and Camilla are currently leading the Straelkan Military, and I have no doubt that Jacqueline is leading Esdeath's army to meet them head-on. While she's preoccupied with them, we can sneak our way to the Western Nations and defeat the occupying force in order to create another front."

"And if that works, then the Revolutionary Army and the Path of Peace can come back out of hiding to create a third one." continued Esdeath with a grin.

"You have that much faith in them?" questioned Najenda with traces of doubt lacing her words, and in response both Tatsumi and Esdeath nod their heads. "Well then, I guess we're going to the Western Nations then. Since you guys just got back here though from a whole other continent, take the night off and we'll leave first thing tomorrow."

"That sounds like a great idea."

Najenda smiled at Tatsumi's eagerness to take the rest of the day off and she quickly remembered something, her gaze darting over to Esdeath. "Now with that out of the way, how was it? Y'know…"

Her cheeks turned red and Esdeath smiled when she realized what Najenda was asking about. "Tatsumi was right, it was a girl. Her name is Lucena."

"We left her in the care of a trusted friend back in Straelka, and when the revolution is over he's going to bring her to us." said Tatsumi as he got up from his chair and stretched out his back, Esdeath and Najenda standing up after him.

"Good idea. The Empire as it is now with Jacqueline around is not a good place for a newborn to be in, especially if it's yours." replied Najenda as she opened the door for them and walked out of the room last.

They made their way from the bedrooms back out to the common area where everyone else was at, the members of Night Raid and the Jaegers chatting amongst themselves about the events that had transpired in the past seven months. Kurome was especially having a good time talking with Run and Wave again, with Akame also joining in on their conversation.

On the other side of the room Chelsea was bragging to Leone and Mine about taking care of Lucena, their expressions showing mixed feelings of jealousy and awe when she told them about the assassination attempt.

"Everyone, can I have your attention." announced Najenda sternly, the room instantly quieting down so she could be heard clearly.

"First thing tomorrow morning we will be heading out towards the Western Nations. While the Great General and her army is preoccupied with the invading army of the Eastern Nation, the Kingdom of Straelka, we can slip by unnoticed and work to liberate our western allies." she stated with a straight face, her audience slowly nodding their head. "So take the rest of today to gather yourselves and get ready, because once we leave this base, we'll have to be on the constant look out for the Great General and her forces."

With that she ended the short meeting and she walked off, Esdeath and Tatsumi going to sit by Chelsea's group when she motioned for them to come over. As soon as they sat down Akame picked herself and grabbed her sword, Wave catching her out of the corner of his eye and wondering what she was going to do.

"Where are you going?" asked her sister, Akame glancing back at her and winking.

"Getting us some food. Tonight's gonna be fish." she replied before starting to head for the exit, Wave watching her for a couple of seconds before he got up and followed her.

"Need some help?" he asked with a smile, the assassin looking at him and waiting for a reason why. "Since I was in the navy my speciality is fish, so...yeah."

"Grab your Teigu then, you're gonna need it."

Wave quickly snatched Grand Chariot's Key and followed Akame out of the common room and to the secret hideout exit, the pair stepping into the darkened cavern in was hidden in after Lubbock opened the doors for them. Wave rested his navy blue cutlass on his right shoulder as they emerged back out into the sunlight of the setting sun and immediately took a right along the ridgeline, his vertigo slowly creeping back and causing him to become a little green.

Akame noticed his reaction and she laughed a little, the former seaman glancing at her and quickly getting his act together.

"So, where exactly are we going to get fish? I didn't see any lakes or rivers on our way here." he asked when they left the ridge and walked out onto more open ground on the plateau, a few trees in the distance.

"Just wait and see."

Wave shrugged and he continued to follow Akame towards the grouping of trees, soon finding out that it was a small part of a larger forest. He offered to take the lead so he could cut his way through the thick brush with Grand Chariot's Key and she agreed, the Jaeger gripping the cutlass tightly and beginning to hack away.

"So, how long were you in the Imperial Navy?" asked Akame out of the blue, Wave looking back and shrugging.

"About three years, I entered when I was seventeen. I was born in a fishing village along the coast so I already had a love for the sea." he said with a smile as he chopped a particularly large branch in half. "And then I was called back to be a part of the Jaegers, blah blah blah, you know the rest of the story."

They stepped past the fallen branch and Akame smiled softly at the mentioning of the sea, Wave catching it out of the corner of his eye. "Do you like the sea too or something?"

"Kind of." she replied while stopping for a moment, Wave doing to same and rested his sword on his shoulder again. "It's just that I have a wish, when all of this is over, that I can sail around the world with my friends."

"You've never been outside the Empire?"

"No, I havn't. That's why when you guys left for the Eas-I mean the Kingdom of Straelka, I was actually a little jealous."

Wave chuckled before starting to cut a path through the trees again, the sound of running water hitting their eardrums a few slashes later telling the two that they were close to its source.

"That sounds like a great idea. You know, if I remember correctly, my parents back in my hometown owned a fairly large fishing boat that I used to go on with my dad and help him. I can take you and the others out on it if you want." he said over his shoulder, Akame's face brightening up and her eyes shooting wide open in surprise at the unexpected offer.

"You would do that?"

"Of course, it's what friends do, right?" he asked as he turned towards her and gave her a grin, Akame's gaze turning away from his while her cheeks turned a slight shade of red.

When Wave cut his way through another grouping of branches and leaves the entire forest opened up into a picturesque scene one could find only in paradise. There was a large lake in the center of the clearing, and it was fed by a decently sized river running down a waterfall directly across from them. What they were looking at the most though were giant aquatic fish leaping up and out of the lake, their stomachs instantly growling at the sight of them.

"Alright, let's try to get the largest one." said Akame as she set Murasame down in the grass next to her.

"Here, allow me." said Wave before he activated Grand Chariot and became consumed by the armor, his fists tightening as he approached the lake's edge.

Akame had no idea what he was planning on doing until he leaped into the air and held both of his feet out, his target the very center of the large lake.

"Grand Fall!" he bellowed, Akame watching in awe as he shot back down towards the earth like a screaming bullet and smashed into the water.

The entire contents of the lake exploded around him in a huge plume of water that rocketed hundreds of feet into the air, Akame quickly spotting at least a dozen large fish flapping around in the air and grinning. She twirled the hunting knife in her hand and unfolded a large sack in her other, her hunting instincts taking control. In a flash she swept through the falling water and fish, snagging all of the ones she had spotted from the ground and tossing them into the bag.

After the last one had been grabbed she returned to the lake coast and waited for Wave, who had landed back in the water and was striding towards her.

"That worked out quite well if I do say so myself." he said as Grand Chariot deactivated and returned to its Key form.

"Actually, that was pretty smart." replied Akame before tossing the still wriggling sack of fish over her shoulder, Wave bending down and picking up Murasame for her.

"Thank you."

They left the small slice of paradise behind and made tracks back to the secret hideout, a few knocks on the door telling Lubbock to open the door for them again. His eyes nearly popped out of his head at the sight of all the fish they had caught, and that was the only reaction they got out of him since they had to start preparing the food.

"Try not to mess anything up. Akame's really passionate about her food." he whispered to Wave before they walked off.

Little did they know that Wave and Akame had been followed by two figures clad in dark brown traveling cloaks, the one without a hood being extraordinarily tall while the second figure carried a large lance in its hand. However, they had no interest in attacking the Jaegers and Night Raid, in fact, their purpose was that of an observer from afar.

"That Great General probably already knows that they're back." stated the tall figure before glancing over at his comrade and crossing his arms. "What say you...Magress?"

The second figure glared at the rocky formation that hid the secret base and closed his eyes, a heavy sigh emerging out from underneath the cloak's hood.

This person was the certain "problem" that had been plaguing the Empire and its forces for the past several weeks. His name was Arius Magress, the "One Man Army" that had laid waste to countless Imperial Army units and turned the Empire's southern lands into his territory. Nobody knew why he was picking a fight with the strongest military force on the continent, well, second strongest now that the Kingdom of Straelka had made landfall and was establishing a beachhead, but instead of failing like everyone else who had come before him, he was annihilating everyone in his path.

"I don't really want to get involved with them...but at the same time, they might be able to help me accomplish my goal." stated Magress in a deep voice as he pierced the tip of his lance into the ground, his glowing red eyes opening once again. "Even if that Great General herself appears before me, I will destroy her. No one shall stand in my way."

The first man slowly nod his head and turned away from the cliff, saying "Very well. Let us set up camp here and wait for them to depart."

Magress shrugged his shoulders and picked up his lance again, his cloak flapping in the wind and revealing a small portion of the black armor he wore at all times. He could still remember when he had first gotten the set and was thankful that he had chosen it, because the power it held was on a whole other level when compared to other sets. He could think of only two others that could match it in strength and overall combat prowess, and like he remembered seeing before, they were both in the possession of the Jaegers and Night Raid.

" _Incursio and Grand Chariot...the two armor-type Teigu forged from the flesh of the Danger Beast known as Tyrant. I might just engage you both myself to see if the reputation my armor possesses really is true…_ "

 **\- The Next Day -**

 **\- 9:00 A.M -**

Tatsumi's internal alarm clock started to ring and he slowly emerged from the doldrums of slumber, his eyes cracking open and a yawn escaping from his lips.

"Good morning sweetheart."

He glanced down and saw that Esdeath was resting her arms on his chest again, her chin sitting atop them and a smile on her face.

"Morning." he replied as he shifted his position a little under the covers and sighed happily. "It feels good to sleep in a bed again…those bunks on that airship were so uncomfortable."

"Tell me about it…" murmured Esdeath as she pushed herself up and rubbed her eyes, Tatsumi grinning when he was treated to an unrestricted view of her breasts.

She noticed him staring and rolled her eyes before bringing up and arm to cover them up and return her husband's attention back to her face. He laughed a little because of the look on her face and she sighed, her other hand reaching up and playfully poking him in the nose as if to tell him now was not the time.

"What can I say? They're a beautiful sight." he said honestly.

"You're damn right they are." said Esdeath with a dirty smirk before she hoisted herself off the bed and stepped towards the closet where their clothes were hanging.

Tatsumi followed her over and they dressed together just like they had been doing for quite some time now, and when everything was in order he was about to head out the door before Esdeath tapped him on the shoulder. He turned and when he saw his necklace hanging from her index finger, an expectant look on her face, he quickly snatched it away and lifted it up and over his head.

"Thank you." he said as he made sure to flip the black cross around to reveal the ice heart embedded on its backside.

They stepped out of their room and were met by Wave and Akame, which was a strange sight in of itself considering they normally weren't seen together that much. When asked about it she was the one to explain that he was telling her about his time out with the Imperial Navy, and when they continued down the hallway away from them Esdeath glanced at Tatsumi and they both grinned at one another when they had the same thought.

A few minutes later both Night Raid and the Jaegers left the secret hideout behind with packs of supplies slung onto their horses and began their journey towards the Western Nations, their observers from afar quickly taking notice and packing up as well to be ready to follow them.

Once they got far enough away from the hideout the two organizations kicked it into overdrive and had their horses break from their light gallop to a full sprint, their hoofs striking the ground and making a sound like thunder. The landscape blew past them as a blur and soon enough they had gone far enough northwest that they were back within one of the many forests dominating the Empire's landscape.

However, this was the end of their easy run since upon entering the forest they slowed almost to a crawl when they all heard the sound of marching in the distance. Esdeath almost instantly recognized that it was an army belonging to the Empire and she informed everyone to be quiet as they continued their trek.

A soft wind blew through the treetops and a lone leaf broke away from a branch Tatsumi had to push out of the way, the leaf spiralling upward within the wind and getting caught in an updraft that pushed it far out towards the east. After a few minutes of flying among the birds the wind died down and the leaf slowly drifted towards the ground and a pair of figures standing on a cliff overlooking a large valley filled with trees.

"Anything?" asked Dreivas impatiently as he tapped his foot against the dirt, the Inquisitor saying nothing when he made another scan of the treetops with his eyes wide open.

"No, nothing." he said before rubbing his right eye.

"You know, how exactly are you able to see that far without your Teigu?" asked Dreivas with a glance at the former assassin, the Inquisitor chuckling.

He turned towards the Teigu and pointed with a finger at his eyes, the yellow irides suddenly pulsating slightly. "It's an ability Brahmastra grants me as its user. I call it Eagle Eye, and in its most basic sense it allows me to see things far beyond the normal view range of the human eye. With it I've been able to see the eyes of a man without my Teigu's scope from over three thousand meters away."

"Damn. Seems like a very useful ability for sniping, but what about close-combat? Wouldn't you be at a disadvantage?" asked Dreivas, the Inquisitor chuckling again.

"See for yourself." he said before he pushed his hands into his pockets and faced Dreivas, his eyes wide open. "Try to punch me in the jaw."

Dreivas stared at him with a wary eye for a few moments before shrugging and clenching his right fist tightly, the Teigu rearing back and throwing a punch right for the Inquisitor's jaw. His fist hadn't even traveled a half a foot before the Inquisitor had already stepped aside, lunged forward and planted his palm right at the base of Dreivas' throat, stopping him right in his tracks.

"What the hell?!" stammered Dreivas in total disbelief, the Inquisitor closing his eyes and grinning as he stepped back and dusted himself off. "How were you able to do that?"

"A normal human's reflex speed is around .3 seconds, and with training and combat experience I'd give a person such as Jacqueline or Esdeath a reflex speed of .1 seconds. _My_ reflexes, on the other hand, as a result of using Brahmastra, are six times that of a normal human's and twice that of the two I mentioned earlier, at around .05 seconds. I call it Marginal Counter."

"Incredible." remarked Dreivas after crossing his arms.

"It's both a blessing and a curse." stated the Inquisitor. "The drawback of Marginal Counter is that it can never be turned off, and extended use of it puts a lot of stress on my eyes, so that's why I always keep them closed and use my other heightened senses to walk around without sight."

Dreivas was amazed by the abilities the Inquisitor's Teigu granted him, but his attitude quickly changed when he looked up and saw a leaf twirl down from the sky in front of his face. His eyes widened when he felt a unique presence come from the leaf and he quickly grabbed it, his connection to nature immediately telling him who had touched the leaf and when it had occurred.

"I know where they are." he said quickly, the Inquisitor turning to face him with a raised eyebrow.

"Where?"

"North from here, probably around ten minutes away if we sprint."

Without another word the two leaped from the cliff's edge and dove down into the trees below, hitting the ground running and going straight for the location of the leaf's origin. Dreivas was leading the way since he could sense the exact location of their targets with the help of the plants around them, and as he cleaved his way through a massive tree he couldn't help but laugh.

" _Now's my chance to finally fight some more strong opponents! I'm so excited I can hardly contain myself!_ "

 **\- Fifteen Minutes Later -**

"Okay, I think we're good for now. Let's pick up the pace again." said Esdeath after scanning the surrounding area with her senses to ensure that the army they heard earlier had finally gone past.

Tatsumi adjusted his position on the horse and popped his neck once before, all of a sudden, his eyes widened when his sixth sense started ringing bells and his instincts took control. The dragon tattoo on his hand glowed bright red and he leaped off his horse over to where Esdeath's was, his body becoming consumed by Tyrannus and his spear manifesting in his right hand just in time for him to deflect a pure bolt of plasma fired at her.

"What in the hell?!" sputtered Lubbock when the bolt struck the ground next to his horse and left a scorched mark, the rest of the group immediately becoming alert.

"Mine!" bellowed Najenda, the pink sniper nodding once as she removed Pumpkin from its carrying case and attached the long barrel to it.

Run formed Mastema's wings and he flew over to her in order to pick her up and fly up into the air, the trees no longer a concern for her. She looked down the sniper scope and looked for any sight of the unknown attacker, her gut feeling telling her that it was no doubt another sniper.

"I can't see where it came from! There's too many trees!" she yelled back down to them, Najenda clacking her teeth in frustration.

Esdeath hopped off her own horse and quickly slammed her hands to the ground, several pillars of ice shooting out of the ground and forming a protective barrier around them in case another shot was fired at them. She guessed right and they all flinched when a second searing hot bolt of plasma easily pierced through the ice shield and struck the grass mere inches away from Chelsea's foot, the suddenness of the attack causing her to jump.

Several more bolts followed after the initial shot and they all hit the ground to avoid being hit, waiting for the eventual ceasing of the barrage. A minute passed by until finally peace and quiet returned to the area and they were allowed to breath easy, their unknown attacker seemingly giving up.

"I can't see them from here with that barrier up. It's your turn." said the Inquisitor over to Dreivas, the two standing atop a large tree branch just high enough to see their targets and covered to the point they were invisible from above.

Dreivas, who laughed as he stabbed his spear into the ground and crossed his arms, closed his eyes, his body beginning to let off a dark green aura when he tapped into his own powers as a Mechanical-type Teigu blessed with nature's touch.

"Allow me to show you why they call me Nature's Wrath, Inquisitor." he said snobbishly when several dark brown roots literally _grew_ out from his feet and dug into the branch, their size and length rapidly expanding out and creating a web of roots underneath the earth after traveling through the trunk of the tree they were on.

They encircled the tiny clearing the Jaegers and Night Raid were standing in and connected themselves to the roots of the trees surrounding them, Dreivas' will transferring over into the plants and bringing them to life in a matter of moments.

"I think he's gone now." said Leone as Esdeath dropped the ice barrier and grasped her rapier's handle just in case, the two groups still wary of another attack.

Run set down Mine on the grass and he deactivated Mastema, the two shaking their heads to confirm Mine's previous statement about not being able to see where the shots were coming from.

Before they could say anything though the ground rumbled and they were shocked when the trees around them began to wriggle and shake as if they had been given a breath of new life. All of a sudden one of the trees lashed out at Kurome with a branch, coming very close to impaling her before Akame cut it to pieces with Murasame.

"Why does everything hate us, even nature?!" yelled Lubbock frantically when the entire forest began to attack them from all sides, their harmless branches becoming whips capable of cutting through skin.

"Dragon Scale Layered Defense!" bellowed Tatsumi, the familiar barrier he had used to defend against Budo's Trump Card appearing around them.

" _You think that will stop the force of nature? Pathetic!_ " thought Dreivas with an evil laugh before he raised a hand up and clenched his fist, the order transferring itself through his roots and to the network he had constructed under the Jaegers and Night Raid.

"I think we'll be fine as long as I keep this barrier up." said Tatsumi through a grunt as he kept a steady flow of energy running into the barrier in order to withstand the devastating blows from the trees.

Unfortunately for them they hadn't counted on anything else attacking them, so when the ground suddenly split open and the roots themselves came out to lash at their ankles and legs, they were all caught off guard. Thankfully Esdeath thought quickly enough and created a giant ice column beneath their feet, propelling them up into the air and far outside the reach of the hostile forest...or so they thought.

The earth around the pillar erupted, releasing massive plumes of dirt as gigantic tree roots snaked out and made their way towards them. When one got a little too close for comfort Mine blasted a large portion away with Pumpkin, but to their frustration the plant merely regrew itself back.

"This has to be the work of a Teigu user, because last time I checked normal plants can't do this kind of shit!" growled Wave as he smashed a smaller branch to splinters with a punch, his armor already activated.

"We can't hold out like this!" exclaimed Esdeath as she impaled the large roots circling their position with equally large sharpened ice pillars.

From afar, the Inquisitor was watching in awe as Dreivas manipulated the giant tree roots to break the ice stabbed through them with brute force and continue to rise up into the air, eventually surpassing the column Esdeath had created and casting a dark shadow on the Jaegers and Night Raid. The Teigu laughed again as he brought his other hand up and opened both hands, the roots halting for a moment to grow layer upon layer of thick, dense tree bark that would increase its weight and crushing power.

" _The force of nature cannot be stopped._ " he thought evilly before he clasped his hands together and issued his final command. " _Flatten the enemy._ "

A series of loud creaks resonated out from the heavy roots as they curled backwards like the tentacles of the kraken itself getting ready to cleave a ship in half, the Jaegers and Night Raid looking at them in terror the farther they pulled back. Tatsumi activated the Dragon Scaled Layered Defense once again to try and protect them from the inevitable attack, and once the red ethereal barrier appeared above their heads they braced themselves.

"Sword of Compassion - Galatine!"

Tatsumi whipped his head around and was shocked to see a figure clad in green and grey trench coat leap into the air above them and land directly on top of the barrier, a massive sword slung over his shoulder, and raise his free hand upwards towards the roots, a green-tinted barrier of energy emerging from the palm of his hand and encompassing the entire column.

The roots swung down at them at full-speed and smashed their bodies against the barrier, the ice column trembling from the sheer force of the brutal attack for a few moments. Their unknown savior then pushed his hand upward and repelled back the roots, allowing him to bring his long sword around and with four quick slashes he cleaved them all in half.

"Who the hell are you?" asked Najenda once the figure landed back on the ice column after Tatsumi dispelled hs shield, their savior's appearance suddenly morphing from green and grey to white and blue. He turned to face them and they were surprised to see that his entire head was covered by a helmet, hiding his face from view.

"All will be explained in due time, for now, let us wait for my companion to return."

"Companion?" asked Run, the white figure nodding.

"Indeed. Right about now he should driving off your attackers."

As the man spoke, Dreivas was busy dealing with the shock of his failed attacked and how he was going to recover and initiate the fight once again. The Inquisitor brought up Brahmastra and was about to engage from long range again before he felt a dark, ominous and hate-filled presence appear in the air above them.

"Look out!" he yelled as he leaped off the branch, but his warning came too late when an armored fist rammed itself deep into Dreivas' jaw, propelling his head and body through the tree and down at least four feet into the earth behind it.

"You bastard! Just who the hell do you think you are?!" snarled Dreivas as he picked himself up out of the ground and stared at his attacker, the Inquisitor aiming Brahmastra at the figure with a stoic expression.

The figure glared at them both with red eyes blazing with unrivaled fury, the lance in the person's grasp and the pitch black armor he wore underneath his traveling cloak enough to give the Inquisitor a good idea as to his identity.

"Who are you?" asked Dreivas, the dark figure raising his Lance and aiming its tip at them.

"I'm your worst nightmare." replied the armored figure, his killer intent laced with his rage and anger.

"Arius Magress, I presume?" asked the Inquisitor with a slight grin, his expectation of a proper response getting shot down when the man merely glared at him in silence.

"We'll see about that-" started Dreivas with a growl, his feet taking him right for his attacker, before a hand from the Inquisitor shot up in front of him.

"No, not now." he said, the Teigu glaring at him angrily.

"We can take him."

"We have no idea how this man fights, and we need to come up with a new strategy since we've lost the element of surprise." said the Inquisitor as he stood up while being sure to keep Brahmastra trained on Magress.

"It pains me to admit this, but you're right." replied Dreivas with a growl, a tree root suddenly appearing next to him and handing off his spear.

He leaped away first, and after a short stare down with Magress the Inquisitor followed after him, leaving behind their armored opponent. Magress waited for a few more moments before sighing heavily and lowering his lance, turning around afterwards and leaping towards the towering ice column in the distance.

"So...who exactly are you?" asked Tatsumi after his feet touched ground, the person in the white and blue trench coat shouldering his long sword and chuckling.

"My given name is King of Kings: Excalibur, but you can just call Excalibur for short."

"You're a Teigu?!" stammered Leone in surprise, Excalibur nodding.

"Indeed. More specifically I am a Mechanical-type Teigu that's similar to a Biological-type in that I can repair myself if damaged." he stated before he turned to face them all and looked from one end of the group to the other. "Now that I've introduced myself, may I please have all of your names?"

Tatsumi glanced around at everyone, including Esdeath, and when no one offered to speak on behalf of the group he stepped forward and began the introductions.

"Uh, sure. I'm Tatsumi, and this is my wife Esdeath. Over there is Wave, Run, Kurome and Chelsea, and standing next to her is Najenda, Lubbock, Akame, Leone and Mine."

"Hello." said Esdeath after he finished, Excalibur acknowledging her with a nod.

"It's a pleasure to meet all of you." he said politely back to them before he crossed his arms. "My comrade should be back momentarily, so if you all would wait here for a few, I would appreciate it."

Wave shrugged and glanced over at Akame, who finally seemed to relax now that the threat of danger was gone, and as a result she sheathed Murasame as did Kurome with Yatsufusa. Five minutes crawled by at an incredibly slow pace, but they all knew when Excalibur's comrade had arrived because of the appearance of a angry and vengeful presence that sent shivers up the spines of some.

The person himself landed beside Excalibur and stood up to his full height, Tatsumi and Wave both getting shocked at the figure's armor and the feeling it both gave them. For some reason they both felt as if the armor was familiar to them, even though they had never seen it before in their lives.

"Everyone, I'd like to introduce my comrade, Arius Magress." stated Excalibur as he motioned to the armored man, his glowing red eyes peering out at them from under his hood and radiating his anger.

He reached up and unbuttoned the cloak, tossing it to the side and fully revealing his black and purple armor for everyone to see before bringing up his lance and pointed it at them.

"Which of you are the wielders of the Teigu Demon Armor: Incursio and Carnage Incarnate: Grand Chariot?" he asked, Tatsumi and Wave tensing up when the mysterious figure referred to them.

"Why are you asking?" questioned Wave cautiously as he stabbed Grand Chariot's key into the ground, confirming Magress' suspicions about one of the wielders being him.

"First, I want to know who is Incursio's wielder." replied Magress harshly while Excalibur remained silent.

Tatsumi glared at the heavily armored figure for a few moments before he held his hand up and showed Magress the tattoo on it, the man looking at it out of intrigue before Tatsumi became consumed by fire, emerging moments later clad in his armor.

"It's not called Incursio any more. It's Demon Dragon's Flesh: Tyrannus now."

"Marvelous, to think it's evolved this much. But...it will still prove to be no match to my armor." said Magress with a laugh as he stabbed his lance into the ground and lowered both of his arms, Wave activating Grand Chariot moments later just in case.

"What do you mean by that? What makes your armor so special?" asked Esdeath with a gleam in her eye, her own suspicions as to the origin of the black and purple armor Magress wore becoming known.

"Grand Chariot and Incursio were forged from the flesh of the Danger Beast known as Tyrant. Incursio inherited it's uncanny ability to adapt and evolve over time, such as its invisibility, yet retained a threat that if the user instigated a forced evolution, they would be at risk." said Magress as he held one hand up to symbolize Tatsumi's armor, the other coming afterwards to represent Wave's. "Grand Chariot, however, was considered the successor to Incursio, since it was created to always be in a state of equilibrium to negate the threat posed to a user by forced evolutions. The downside to this is that it holds no explosive power whatsoever, and that over time Tyrannus would eventually evolve to the point it becomes stronger then Grand Chariot."

"Yes we all know the story, can you get on with it?" snapped Leone impatiently, Magress fixating his cold hard gaze on her for a few moments before growling.

"However, there is more to that story. The hidden truth that not many people know is that, after Incursio and Grand Chariot were created, there was still some of Tyrant's flesh left over. You would think they could just trash it and be done, correct?" asked Magress of the two groups, some of them nodding their heads.

" _Wrong_. In fact, what they did was entirely the opposite of that." said Magress before he clasped his hands together. "Instead, they took what remained of Tyrant and forged a _third_ armor with the idea in mind that this third armor would act as the Trump Card, so to speak, to the first two in the event they fell into the wrong hands. This third armor would eventually become a hybrid, blending the abilities and attributes of Incursio and Grand Chariot into one. It always remains in a state of equilibrium, like Grand Chariot, and it also has the invisibility of Incursio, albeit only being limited to a matter of seconds."

Everyone was left in a state of utter shock, the very thought of a third armor existing aside from Tatsumi's and Wave's astounding. What was causing them all to feel a chill on the back of their spines however was that, deep down, they were starting to realize that the armor Magress was secreting an almost invisible aura of dark purple energy.

"My armor is that hybrid. The third armor of Tyrant, Unholy God Eater: Imperator." stated Magress as he parted his hands and unleashed a wave of power that blew back everyone's hair from the sheer strength of it and caused the trees to whip around wildly.

A ring of purple fire emerged around him in the grass and he held out both arms, two pillars of flame rising up from the ground and consuming them much like how Tatsumi would summon Neuntote.

"Auxiliary Armaments - Carnificem and Impeius." stated Magress before withdrawing his hands from the fire, a black long-sword in his left hand and a large shield in his right.

"As its wielder, I, Arius Magress, the One Man Army, challenge you, the wielders of Tyrannus and Grand Chariot, to a duel."

Tatsumi was at first taken aback by the man's proclamation, but a mere glance from Esdeath and the grin on her face was all the inspiration he needed. He stepped forward and manifested Neuntote in his grasp, Wave doing the same with his cutlass Silber.

"Very well. We accept your challenge!" announced Tatsumi, his lips curling upward into a smile when the adrenaline began to pump through his body.

Magress laughed as he twirled his sword around and brought his hefty shield up in anticipation for their assault, the ring of purple fire at his feet fizzling out.

"Let us see which armor is superior! Hold nothing back!"

"With pleasure!"

To give Tatsumi, Wave and Magress enough room to fight, Esdeath had done the service of erecting a massive wall of ice around the edge of the little clearing they were in and pushed it outwards, the forest going with it until they had a surrogate arena devoid of any obstructions. Afterwards she and Najenda took everyone to the outskirts of the wall to watch and wait for the final result of the duel with Excalibur.

Before leaving, she had taken Tatsumi in her arms and had looked him straight in the eyes with that confident grin of hers.

"Win. I know you're stronger then him." she had said, Tatsumi laughing as he recalled the statement one last time before he wiped any unnecessary thoughts from his mind that didn't pertain to the duel with the infamous One Many Army.

His limbs were already starting to shake from the adrenaline, his heart pumping twice as fast. His grin grew in size at the anticipation, and a glance at Wave told him that his armored companion was experiencing the same thing.

"You ready Wave?" he asked, the Jaeger slowly nodding as he gripped Silber backhanded and got into a combat stance.

"As ready as I'll ever be."

Magress looked from one opponent to the other before chuckling, the fingers around the handle of his longsword flexing one by one to remove the tension in them. He could clearly sense that they were strong, especially the one wielding Tyrannus, and he himself was starting to feel excited. However he quickly locked away that emotion and instead opened the floodgates for his anger and rage to flow into every fiber of his being and empower him.

" _Nothing will stand In my way. Nothing will prevent me from fulfilling my revenge against those who have wronged me. All with fall before me!_ " he told himself, the three sentences a mantra he had created years prior to remind himself of his purpose, his reason for fighting.

This reason alone was what gave him his strength, what have him the infamous nickname "One Man Army". He had allowed his rage and anger to consume his very soul, giving him extraordinary reserves of raw power that his armor fed off and used to grow even stronger.

Slowly it began to manifest in a dark purple, almost black, aura that seemed to be seeping out of not his armor, but from his very body contained within Imperator. It grew larger and larger the more he let his anger take control, but as quickly as it appeared it vanished like a puff of smoke, returning to its source.

With a single breath, he said, "Come. Show me your strength."

In a split second Tatsumi and Wave were right on top of them, their weapons lunging right for his abdomen and throat. Magress brought his shield up to block Wave while he used his sword to deflect Tatsumi's spear and push him to the side, allowing him to focus solely on facing Wave for a few moments. They exchanged a couple of blows with their blades before Tatsumi returned to the fight by smashing his heels into Magress' back, launching him forward several meters and opening him up to attack.

"Go!" he exclaimed, the two Jaegers rushing Magress from different directions in a pincer maneuver.

"You think _that_ can stop me?!" bellowed Magress at the top of his lungs as he brought Impeius around and rammed the edge of the shield into Wave's jaw while swinging at Tatsumi with Carnificem.

He ducked under the blade and stabbed at a joint between the shoulder pauldron and chest plate of Magress' armor, growling when the man figured out his intention and leaped away to avoid the jab. By that time Wave had recovered from the blow to his jaw and had returned to Tatsumi's side again, their gazes meeting their opponent's and holding firm.

"You two are indeed strong. I haven't fought opponents such as yourself in quite some time." he said before, to their surprise, he dropped his shield and deconstructed it, leaving him with just his sword. "However...this isn't even the full extent of my power!"

Suddenly the air around him exploded outwards with such concussive force it pushed Tatsumi and Wave a few feet, a blazing inferno of purple fire igniting around him a second later. Magress began to growl as he accumulated more and more power, the flames growing larger with each passing second.

"Awakening - God of Destruction!" he roared, the flames swirling around in becoming even brighter when his armor began to glow, the metal plates shifting as if a divine entity had breathed life into it.

Over at the very edge of the makeshift arena standing on a raised platform made of ice,the members of Night Raid and the Jaegers were caught off guard when Magress began to secrete insane amounts of energy and power.

"What's he doing?" asked Lubbock through the wind blowing past them, Excalibur chuckling as he stood rigidly still as if nothing was going on.

"He's activating his Trump Card...to think I would be this lucky to see it."

"His Trump Card?" questioned Akame.

"Indeed. Imperator's Trump Card is what separates itself from Grand Chariot and Incursio."

"Tyrannus." corrected Run, the Teigu apologizing.

"Sorry, Tyrannus. Still not used to the name change, but I digress, Imperator's Trump Card is unique since as stated previously, it is a hybrid of Grand Chariot and Tyrannus."

"Well, what is it then?"

Before Excalibur could say anything another explosion of pressurized air zoomed past them, their attention immediately returning to Magress again when the flames burning around him began to crawl into his body and congregate on his back. Suddenly they shot outward as two massive streams that took on the distinct appearance of wings, the flames beginning to solidify and become more like flesh and bone.

Finally Magress stood up from his kneeling position and threw his shoulders back, the flames instantly extinguishing themselves and revealing dark purple feathery wings emerging out from his armor, their immense size enabling him to create gale-force winds with just a single flap.

" _This_ is the Trump Card of Imperator. With it, my victory is assured!" proclaimed Magress as he began to hover above the ground, Tatsumi and Wave bracing themselves against the winds his wings were generating.

"True Auxiliary Armament - Leomurg."

Magress formed another weapon in his left hand, this time a not her lance, but the difference between his previous one and this new one was that Leomurg was definitely larger, longer and incredibly sharp, while on the other hand it also had more intricate designs and such implemented into its body.

He thought that with summoning his final weapon and activating his Trump Card he would scare his opponents into submission, but to his surprise the opposite happened. Instead of backing down, Tatsumi merely laughed at the sight of him and twirled Neuntote around a few times while Wave cracked his knuckles and popped his neck.

"Is this meant to scare us? Because I've seen worse!" exclaimed Tatsumi before he grabbed Wave's arm and threw him straight at Magress.

"Grand Fall - Lateral!" he bellowed, his feet smashing into their opponent's gut and knocking all the wind out of him.

However his large wings mitigated most of the backwards force by flapping several times, allowing Magress to quickly recover and punch Wave in the jaw. He followed up by lunging at him with his lance and growled when he missed by inches, the Jaeger avoiding the attack in midair and bounding away to rethink his strategy.

When nothing came to attack him a few moments later Magress finally realized that Tatsumi had vanished from sight, meaning that he must've activated his Teigu's own Trump Card.

" _Damn...Where could he have gone?_ " he thought before he swooped to the side to avoid Wave, the man growling at his inability to effectively land a hit on his airborne enemy.

"You bastard!" he yelled, Magress laughing at him before an overwhelming presence overtook his senses and actually paralyzed him for a fraction of a second.

Unfortunately for him that fraction of a second was all the time Tatsumi needed to reappear from the very air itself and slice clean through Imperator's right wing, severing it from his back and removing his ability to fly.

"I wouldn't get so cocky if I were you." said Tatsumi with a grin as he leaped back, Matters growling under his breath as he landed on his feet and looked over his shoulder at the wing lying on the ground behind him.

"No...you will not stop me. My vengeance shall be fulfilled!" he roared, his anger rocketing through the roof again and giving him another explosive boost in power.

In a flash he assaulted Wave with both his fist and his lance, striking him several times over and chipping away at Grand Chariot until he uppercut him in the jaw and spread him out across the ground. Magress brought around Leomurg and pierced through his armor and right shoulder until it emerged out from the other side, Wave grunting in pain.

"Wave!" shouted Tatsumi before rushing over to stop him from injuring his friend any further, but Magress was too quick for him and grasped him by the face of his helmet when he lunged at him.

He knocked away Neutnote and threw Tatsumi high up into the air before following him up with a powerful jump that left a tiny crater behind in his wake. When he reached his target he turned end over end and extended his right leg out, Tatsumi's eyes widened when he saw the heel come straight for him.

"Guillotine Drop!"

Magress drove his heel down onto Tatsumi's abdomen and knocked him back down towards the earth at breakneck speed, his rapid acceleration from a standstill happening so fast that his body actually broke the sound barrier and created a sonic boom before crashing down into the ground with a thunderous explosion.

"Tatsumi!" yelled Wave before he cringed and had to return to laying on his back since Magress had pinned him to the ground with his lance, driving it in at such an angle that he couldn't remove it with his other free hand.

At that time Magress touched down on the ground again and glanced over at the crater Tatsumi's body had created on impact, the dust cloud it had formed finally beginning to dissipate. What he saw caused him to gasp and marvel at how it was even humanly possible.

Tatsumi was already on his feet, albeit with a hand over his obviously broken rib cage, and breathing heavily in agonizing pain from the devastating axe-kick. Part of his helmet had also been ripped away as well, revealing a portion of his battered face and the blood seeping out from the corner of his mouth.

"You were able to survive my Guillotine Drop? How? No one has ever been able to walk away from it!" said Magress in disbelief, Tatsumi laughing weakly as he removed the arm from his gut and grinned.

"If you haven't already noticed, I am one tough son of a bitch to take down." he replied before, to Magress' astonishment, reforming Neutnote in his hand and aiming it at him. "You wanted to fight right? Bring it."

Magress felt a vein bulge out and he clenched his fists tightly, the rage inside bubbling up and past his limit once again due to his frustration with this man standing before him. He had struck him with his most devastating move, and yet here he is, standing before him with a grin on his face. He stretched an arm out and reformed his long-sword in his fingers, the blade glistening in the sun as he swung it around and held it firm.

"I'll make sure you stay down this time." he snarled before rushing Tatsumi with Carnificem at his side, his intention being to lunge right at him with a head-on attack that would use his speed as the driving force.

Tatsumi waited for Magress to get close and, when he was almost right on top of him, he pulled back Neutnote and stepped to the side, the leading edge of Carnificem scraping by the spear and leaving Magress entirely open to attack. The armored fighter swore when Tatsumi reared back with his other hand and drove his balled up fist straight into the left cheek of Magress' helmet, the force of the blow enough to make him lose hold on his sword and throw him off to the side for a good fifty meters. He hit and skipped off the ground a few times before coming to a halt, Tatsumi glaring at him as he slowly picked himself up and hunched over. Suddenly a loud series of cracks echoed out from where he stood, Tatsumi wondering what they could be before Magress returned to his full height and turned towards him with a hand to his face.

He had managed to crack and break Imperator, the helmet cheek he had punched now a spider web that threatened to fall apart at any moment. Tatsumi couldn't help but smile and marvel at his accomplishment while Magres was left in utter awe at the fact that his armor had actually been _damaged_. Never before had this happened, and the feeling, to be honest, was overwhelming.

Before he could continue to contemplate with the situation another sound sort of like a "ca-chink", and to both his shock and Tatsumi's, the spider web gave way and shattered to pieces. The cracks continued up the cheek until finally a small portion of Imperator's helmet had broken away, giving Tatsumi a view of the identity of the man known as the One Man Army.

Tatsumi's eyes widened when, staring right back at him, was the blue eye of Arius Magress, and protruding out from underneath the helmet just above it was a lock of the man's hair. It was colored lavender, which was actually kind of strange to be honest. He was expecting it to be brown or black, but lavender? He didn't know why, but now that he had gotten a glimpse of Magress underneath his armor, he felt as if there was something _off_ about him.

"You...You actually managed to damage Imperator…" he said, Tatsumi awakening from his trance and glaring at Magress as he lowers his hand away from his face.

Tatsumi watched the blue eye blink once before Magress tightened his fists and inhaled deeply, his power beginning to rise once again. The dark purple aura seeped out from his armor and Tatsumi brought an arm up to guard his from the wind when it began to pick up once again as a result of the power surge.

"Tell me...what are your volitions, Jaeger? What tragedy have you experienced in your lifetime that has made you want to fight against the Empire?" he asked.

"My best friends were murdered by wealthy aristocrats from the Empire, and I've experienced first hand the atrocities that the Prime Minister has allowed to occur." stated Tatsumi darkly, his own anger beginning to appear. "That is why I'm fighting. That's why we're _all_ fighting. Prime Minister Honest needs to pay for his sins."

Magress closed his eyes and slowly nod his head up and down in agreement. "Yes...that is indeed a tragedy."

Suddenly his eyes shot wide open and Tatsumi gasped when he recognized Tyrant's trademark cross-slit pupil present in his visible eye, only instead of its blue color the eye was a dark purple and the pupil itself was bright red. His power flared once again and he was surrounded by purple fire, Tatsumi bracing himself with the help of his spear.

"However...your pain is _nothing_ compared to mine." he replied, Tatsumi raising an eyebrow in confusion.

"What did he do to you to deserve your hate?"

"Prime Minister Honest...he ordered the public execution of my parents." snarled Magress, Tatsumi's eyes shooting wide open. "My father was a high-ranking member of the Imperial Army, and when he refused to give in to the Prime Minister's influence...he and my mother were wrongly tried as traitors to the Empire, imprisoned, tortured, and eventually publicly executed."

Even Wave had overheard the armored man's statement and he was left in utter awe and horror at the tragedy the man had endured. He thought back to his own parents and he got a chill up his spine when he imagined them being killed because of his status as a traitor and rogue.

"The unjust murder of my parents...that is why _I_ fight. I will personally separate the Prime Minister's head from his shoulders. And no one will stand in my way! Not you! Not _anyone_! I'll kill anyone who tries to stop me from avenging my parents!" yelled Magress at the top of his lungs, Tatsumi noticing a small tear fall from the corner of his visible eye.

The unrivaled pain and sorrow he could see in that eye of his was enough to make Tatsumi shudder and feel nothing but empathy for his opponent. He had been hit hard when encountered with his friends dying before his very eyes, but the thought of watching your own two parents, the people who raised you since birth, be executed on false accusations...it was mind-blowing. He staggered a little when he lost feeling in his legs and quickly regained his balance, his gaze remaining glued to Magress as he slowly accumulated unimaginable levels of power. He was even starting to think that the previous transformation he had instigated earlier, which had assumed was Imperator's Trump Card, was in fact not his most powerful move.

"I will end this fight here and now. Bear witness to Imperator's full power! Life Taker - Judecca Rising!"


	28. Confrontation

A/N The man known as Arius Magress has finally made his appearance, and it has been revealed that there was actually a third armor crafted from the flesh of Tyrant named Unholy God Eater: Imperator. And to test the reputation it holds as being the "Trump Card" to both Grand Chariot and Tyrannus (Incursio), he challenges Tatsumi and Wave to a duel. Place your bets now ladies and gentlemen! Who will win? The Demon Dragon's Flesh and Carnage Incarnate or the Unholy God Eater? Leave a fav and review, and prepare your faces for a long ass chapter.

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 **Chapter 27 - Confrontation**

"I will end this fight here and now. Bear witness to Imperator's full power! Life Taker - Judecca Rising!" bellowed Magress, the dark aura surrounding him rapidly expanding outward and shooting up into the sky, Tatsumi stepping back and watching as the energy solidified and took on the form of someone he and everyone else observing them could recognize.

The silhouette of Tyrant appeared around Magress and held up its clawed hands around him on either side, the sky beginning to darken as blackish-grey clouds developed above the arena. The dragon's silhouette, instead of being a manifestation of the real thing like when Tatsumi or Wave would activated their armors, was pitch black and the only distinctive feature it had were its characteristic red eyes.

Seeing the dragon and the drastic increase in Magress' power and strength baffled Esdeath and the rest of the observers, while Excalibur only chuckled and crossed his arms.

"Why is he transforming again? Wasn't that earlier mode his Trump Card?" asked Leone, the mechanical Teigu shaking his head and glancing back at her.

"Unfortunately, no. I'm sorry but I lied when I stated that it was his Trump Card that he used earlier. This is Imperator's real Trump Card, "Like Taker - Judecca Rising", where the armor draws upon the anger, rage and very life force of its user to instigate a temporary evolution that drastically increases its abilities."

"A temporary evolution?" asked Esdeath.

"Yes. Similar to how Tyrannus can evolve and adapt overtime, Imperator's Trump Card allows the armor to instigate a temporary evolved state. I've never seen him use it, but he's told me that this Trump Card alone is how he received the nickname "One Man Army"."

Excalibur then turned his back on them once again and stared hard at the two fighters in the distance, the silhouette of Tyrant roaring. Tatsumi may have been able to survive the Guillotine Drop...but now that Magress has activated his Trump Card...there's no chance he'll be able to survive."

Esdeath's eyes widened and she returned her attention to Tatsumi, her heart and mind screaming at her to stop the fight and prevent her husband from dying if Magress was indeed becoming strong enough to do so.

Suddenly the manifestation of Tyrant behind Magress vanished, the aura that composed its body returning to his armor and finishing the transformation. Several new horns had grown out of the helmet and its gold colored portions had morphed into a dark purple, and grasped tightly in his right hand was an entirely new lance different from Leomurg and the one he had previously before they started their duel.

"Perish." said Magress in almost a whisper before he vanished, reappearing a split second later just a mere couple of inches away from Tatsumi and catching him completely off guard.

He smashed his kneecap into Tatsumi's gut and knocked the wind out of him, his free hand being used to knock him to the side with a vicious punch that broke apart a large portion of Tyrannus' helmet and revealed more of Tatsumi's face. Tatsumi growled and returned a powerful blow of his own that made his attacker stumble back a few feet, the strength he still held despite his broken rib cage and various other injuries throwing Magress for a loop.

" _He still holds this much strength?! Impossible!_ " he thought in disbelief.

"I won't die that easily!" roared Tatsumi as he ripped off what remained of his helmet and spit out some blood, his eyes blazing with power as he reared back with Neuntote and launched the spear at Magress.

He was too slow to react and the spear punctured his left shoulder in a joint in his armor, Magress growling as he quickly removed it and tossed it aside. The distraction allowed Tatsumi to rush him and slam a foot into his side, knocking him off balance so he could use the tail his armor had grown during its last evolution to take his feet out from under him.

Tatsumi clenched both of his fists and raised them high above his head, several cracks echoing from his midsection as a result of his ribs, before he brought them down hard onto Magress and sent his body three feet deep into the ground. He was able to recover fast though and he lunged at Tatsumi with his lance, catching him in the side and slicing deep enough through Tyrannus to reach skin. He leaped back as Magress pulled himself out and gripped his side, cursing under his breath when he brought his hand back and saw blood on it.

" _I can't keep this up for long...I feel like I'm gonna pass out any second!_ " he thought desperately when Magress attacked him again, using his lance to put Tatsumi on the defensive.

"Why won't you give up?!" demanded Magress, pronouncing each word after a swing and stab with his lance while Tatsumi dodged or blocked them.

"The same reason why you won't...I will not rest until the Empire becomes a better place! I have someone waiting for me!" he replied with a battle cry before batting aside the lance and rearing back for another punch.

Magress couldn't defend himself yet again and Tatsumi's knuckles rammed deep into his gut, the impact so great it created another spider web of cracks to lance out from from his fist and made Magress double over in pain. He coughed vigorously and sucked up the pain, his rage pushing him beyond his limits and enabling him to recover quickly yet again and return the blow. They traded punches and kicks, their powerful strikes causing bits and pieces of both Tyrannus and Imperator to break and fly off in every direction

"Who could be so important that you would risk your life to take down the most powerful nation in existence?!" questioned Magress after doubling back from a harsh kick to the rib cage, Tatsumi letting out a heavy breath and spitting some more blood to the side.

He fixated his tired gaze on him and smiled weakly, "You see that woman back there with the blue hair?"

Magress took a quick glance over his shoulder and spotted Esdeath based off of Tatsumi's description, replying back, "Yes. What about her?"

"She's my wife...and right now, in the Eastern Nation...our daughter is waiting for us." he said, the visible eye of Arius Magress widening in shock.

"Seven months earlier, we left the Empire...and seven months later she gave birth to her there, far out of the reach of Prime Minister Honest and the corrupt regime. I originally wanted to make the Empire a better place for all by killing Honest, but now...now that I have a daughter, that goal has changed. Now, I want to change the Empire so that she can grow up without suffering through what we all have gone through. That's the real reason...why I fight. I'm fighting for _her_."

After speaking his mind Tatsumi coughed again and collapsed to one knee, the pain coursing through his veins making it unbearable from him to stand up. He sucked in a breath and grunted as he forced himself to stand back up and make eye contact with Magress again, who was left speechless at his devotion and determination.

"I've fought against some of the strongest in the Empire...the old and new Great General, the Three Beasts...my own friends, the infamous assassins known as Night Raid, before we settled our differences, and even the very Danger Beast my armor was forged from when he attempted to take over my body. So try all you want to kill me...because I'm gonna keep on living for their sake, regardless of any danger thrown at me."

Magress opened his mouth to say something, but he closed it a second later when he couldn't think of anything *to say. He had devoted his entire life to avenging the death of his parents, but to see how far this man would go for the sake of creating a better world for his daughter and taking on even death itself...he couldn't compete with that.

"I see...very well then." he responded in a low voice, Tatsumi getting thrown for a loop when Imperator morphed back to its original appearance and the single wing on his back vanished. "I concede. You win."

At that moment Tatsumi's legs lost all feeling in them and he collapsed to his knees, Tyrannus deconstructing itself and revealing his injuries. Before he could fully hit the ground however, Magress himself caught him and helped him back to his feet by slinging his arm over his shoulder and walking him over to Wave.

"Did you win?" he asked, Tatsumi laughing weakly as Magress removed Leomurg from Wave's shoulder and dissipated the weapon alongside Carnificem and Impeius, which were strewn across the arena.

"Yes, and you should be able to get up now." stated Magress, Wave raising an eyebrow in confusion before he felt a surge of energy return to him and he stood up instantly, albeit wincing a little at his injury.

"What just happened?"

"It's Leomurg's hidden ability that sucks out the energy of the person it stabs." replied Magress before he looked over to where Excalibur was standing with the rest of Tatsumi and Wave's friends and motioned for him to come over.

In a matter of seconds his companion was at his side, Run and Lubbock picking up Tatsumi while Chelsea retrieved a bottle of Solomon's blood from the satchel he gave them and uncorked it. She gave it to Wave first and he took a small sip, cringing as the strange tasting liquid slipped down his throat and instantly repaired his injured shoulder. He handed it to Esdeath and she approached Tatsumi, who already had his mouth open and ready, so she could pour some of the bottle's contents down his own throat.

He shivered at its unnatural taste and he waved his hand for Run and Lubbock to stop supporting him, the two stepping back and allowing him to hunch over and allow the phoenix blood to heal him. A couple of minutes passed, Magress and Excalibur watching in awe as slowly Tatsumi was returned to his normal and healthy self thanks to the miracle healing ability of the blood.

"Whew...I feel much better now." he said with a sigh as he ran a hand through his hair and wiped the dried blood away from his lips.

"Are you sure you're okay?" asked Esdeath just to be sure, Tatsumi grinning and wrapping an arm around her to show her that he was back to feeling good as new.

"I'm fine. I don't plan on dying any time soon." he replied, Esdeath letting out a sigh of relief and returning his hug.

"I'm sorry for putting you in a situation like that." said Magress in a regretful tone, Tatsumi turning towards him and waving his hand through the air as if he was disregarding the whole thing.

"It's fine. It was actually really exciting, that fight."

Excalibur stared at Magress and gasped a little at the sight of one of his eyes and a lock of his hair, and after thinking about what had just occurred for a moment he placed a hand on his shoulder pauldron and motioned at him with his other hand.

"So, he was able to actually damage Imperator, eh?" he asked, his armored friend growling at him while everyone else looked at them and were astonished to discover that this fact was true.

What shocked them even more was that they could see his eye and hair, which only fueled their curiosity as to who this mysterious armored warrior was. When he noticed their stares Magress quickly turned away to hide the broken portion of his helmet and crossed his arms in order to hide the cracked chest piece, but instead of deterring them from prying any further it only made them want to know more.

"Y'know, what do you really look like under all that armor? I know I can't wear Grand Chariot for a long time without getting tired, so I'm assuming you deactivate it ever once in a while, right?" asked Wave while pointing at Imperator.

"That is correct...but I'd prefer to keep wearing it. I hardly grow tired from wearing it anyways." replied Magress.

That was when Excalibur glared at him and tapped his foot several times on the ground until Magress looked at him and raised an eyebrow. "What is it?"

"After challenging them right out of the blue and very nearly killing Esdeath's husband, I think they've earned the right to know who exactly was the one to do so… _Maya_."

An air of silence dropped like a hammer over the two groups, with Magress immediately tensing up and glaring at Excalibur with wide eyes. Tatsumi, Esdeath and everyone else was just as surprised, since the mechanical Teigu had just referred to him as "Maya" which wasn't even his name. Najenda however took the name and began to put the pieces of the puzzle together, and after a few moments she came to a realization about Magress' identity and gasped.

"What is it?" asked Run, the Night Raid leader looking at Magress and grinning slightly.

"Maya?" asked Excalibur expectantly, Magress growling under his breath before he dropped his arms and sighed.

"Fine."

A bright purple light engulfed his body as the armor dematerialized and took on the form of a long lance colored just like Imperator, this weapon obviously its key mode, and when the light vanished they were all left utterly speechless.

"Uh…" murmured Chelsea and Lubbock at the same time while Wave had to rub his eyes to make sure he was seeing clearly.

"You guys are seeing what I'm seeing, right?" asked Kurome, Akame and Leone slowly nodding.

The reason why they were so surprised was that underneath the six and a half foot tall set of armor known as Unhold God Eater: Imperator, Arius Magress wasn't some male warrior sporting battle scars or whatever other stereotypical markings of a true badass. No, the person underneath the cousin of Grand Chariot and Tyrannus wasn't that at all...the "he" they had assumed to be wearing it was actually a "she". And truth be told, she was quite beautiful.

The person known as Arius Magress was a beautiful and slender woman of average height, around 5'7", with waist length lavender hair, a blue right eye and a red left eye, and she was wearing a revealing sleeveless skin-tight, backless top with a teardrop shaped opening on the chest that showed the top portion of her cleavage, two lapels on the front and back, a mesh bottom and an obi around her waist. She also wore stockings that functioned as her shoes and a pair of lavender colored arm warmers that extended out over the back of her hand to wrap around the middle finger of each hand.

"Everyone, I'd like to introduce to you the woman behind the mask of Arius Magress. My trusted friend and companion, Maya Gleipnir." said Excalibur happily, Maya rolling her eyes at him and crossing her arms over her chest.

"Hey." she said with a stoic expression.

"Well, this is certainly interesting." remarked Esdeath with a slight grin, her eyes darting to Tatsumi before she elbowed him lightly in the side and laughed. "You almost got beat by a girl."

He glared at her and she winked, Maya sighing heavily and flipping back a strand of her hair before motioning over her shoulder towards the west. "You guys are heading towards the Western Nations, right?"

"Yes, why are you asking?" questioned Akame, Maya shrugging as she rested Imperator's key on her shoulder and put her other hand on her hip.

"I'm going with you guys. I've gotten bored dealing with normal Imperial Soldiers, and I've heard that an infamous division called the Hellraisers were sent to the Western Nations to keep order there."

 **\- Fifteen Miles Away -**

"Okay, this seems like a good spot to rest for a few and figure out our next move." said Dreivas after creating a small enclosure of plant roots and branches around them, offering them protection from the storm brewing above.

The Inquisitor set down Brahmastra's carrying case and leaned up against one of the plant hut's walls, letting out a sigh when the machines inside his body ceased their functions and gave him a moment's rest.

"For starters, we still have to find my Mistress and inform her of the discovery we have made." he replied, Dreivas glancing over at him and crossing his arms.

"I might actually have a way to cut down on the time for that." he said, the Inquisitor's uncovered eye cracking open half an inch.

"Oh?"

"Before leaving the Imperial Capital to join you I marked her by leaving behind a spore I had created. Right now, even from this far away I can clearly feel her presence and, with that, I can communicate with her." explained Dreivas as he sat down on the grass and crossed his legs over, the Inquisitor already intrigued by what kind of communication he was speaking of.

His questions were answered when various roots grew out of his legs and dug into the grass and earth around him, joining together to become an even larger root that coiled up and got ready to head to its destination.

"Put a hand on my head." ordered Dreivas, the Inquisitor saying nothing and walking over to do just that.

Once his hand was firmly planted on the top of the Teigu's helmet the root that had grown underneath his body lanced out at break-neck speeds, burrowing its way through the soft dirt just inches above the surface and racing towards the location of his spore.

 **\- Eastern Lands of the Empire -**

 **\- Five Minutes Later -**

"Great General, the forward army sent ahead of our current position was wiped out by the advancing Eastern Nation army. In three days time they'll be right on our doorstep." reported one of Jacqueline's officers, the Great General waving a hand to send him off while sighing heavily.

"What are you thinking of doing Jacqueline?" asked Kahfka from her chair inside the command tent, Jacqueline glancing over at her and smiling.

"The strength of the Eastern Nation's military is quite unprecedented, and since we are the most well-trained army in the Empire, if we were to fall in battle here...there would be no one to stop our enemies from attacking the Empire directly." she replied.

"So..are we going to pull back?"

"Yes, that is the best option right now. My duty as Great General ultimately comes to protecting the Emperor, and I can't do that job very well from here." stated Jacqueline after getting up out of her seat and stretching to get the soreness out of her limbs.

When she felt the ground shift slightly under her she looked down and jumped a little when a tree root pushed itself through the earth between her feet. Kahfka took notice of it too and they both felt the familiar vibe of a certain rude mechanical Teigu emanating from it, so they watched warily as it continued to grow in height until it stopped around the same plane as Jacqueline's shoulder.

She looked over at Kahfka for a few moments before reaching for the root and gingerly placing a hand on it. Instantly her mind was filled with the presence of both Dreivas and someone else she easily recognized as the Inquisitor.

" _Jacqueline, can you hear me?_ " she heard him say into her mind as if he were right there next to her.

" _Yes, and is Dreivas enabling you to do this?_ " she asked back.

" _Of course._ "

" _Well, what do you have to report?_ " asked Jacqueline nonchalantly, Kahfka staring at her with a confused expression since she hadn't spoken once since touching the vine.

" _We've found him._ " replied the Inquisitor.

" _Found who, exactly?_ "

" _Arius Magress, the One Man Army. He and an ally of his wielding a long-sword interrupted our attack on the Jaegers and Night Raid._ "

At that Jacqueline's eyes widened in surprise and she looked at Kahfka, her lips curling up into a devious smile. Seems she wouldn't have to conduct her search for the infamous One Man Army at all, since her beloved subordinate had done it for her.

" _Really? Have you two been tracking him?_ " she asked.

" _It has been easy to do so since they joined the Jaegers and Night Raid._ "

She listened silently as the Inquisitor explained to her everything that they had discovered about Arius Magress after faking a retreat and watching from afar, and when five minutes passed by she concluded her conversation with him on a promise that she would arrive at their location soon.

"What was that all about?" asked Kahfka when Jacqueline took her hand off the root and chuckled.

"The Inquisitor and Dreivas have recently encountered our One Man Army that's been a problem for the Empire. And I am going to meet up with them, so I need you to remain here and lead my army back to the capital in my place as de-facto leader." she said while walking over to a nearby table and picking up the coiled Basilisk. "Can you do that for me?"

Kahfka brightened up at the opportunity presented to her to lead Jacqueline's army while she was away and she immediately took it, nodding her head up and down vigorously.

"Thank you, I appreciate it. I'll meet you back at the Capital, okay?"

"Yeah. Good luck." said Kahfka warmly before she stood up and shared a goodbye kiss with her, Jacqueline exiting the tent afterwards.

As soon as she left her army's camp she grabbed a horse and galloped off in the direction of the Inquisitor's presence, the devious smile on her face growing in volume as the excitement of the upcoming battle began to arise. Seven months prior when she had fought Esdeath and that other man, Tatsumi, had definitely been interesting, but fighting someone reputed as a "One Man Army" as well as the Jaegers and Night Raid was making her heart race.

" _I've prepared for this too. I've tripled the density and strength of my bone structure since our last encounter, so much so that even Extase had difficulty cutting through them._ " she thought, the trees blowing past her a mere blur.

The horse she had gotten onto before leaving the camp was not the typical horse used by the Imperial Army, this one was special. It was a unique breed of Danger Beast that could run twice as fast as the fastest horse, so with it she was sure to reach the Inquisitor's location in under a day.

" _I'm coming for you Esdeath, my old superior. And this time...I'll take you back with me and make you watch as I slowly and painfully kill your husband._ "

 **\- Southwestern Lands of the Empire -**

 **\- 8:54 p.m -**

The weary members of Night Raid and the Jaegers had finally gotten out of the large forest they had been in previously when they got attacked by agents from the Empire, undoubtedly sent to hunt them by Jacqueline, then subsequently saved by the infamous Arius Magress, who wasn't even a man at all and was in fact a beautiful woman.

However she hardly ever talked with them and always remained in the back behind the two groups, chatting quietly with Excalibur.

"So she decides to join us then hardly even speaks with us." muttered Leone under her breath after glancing back at Maya for the fourth time in ten minutes. "Hey Lubbock, what do you think?"

"Well, if I had to say...maybe she doesn't trust us yet. I mean, sure we're on the same side and all, but if my parents were executed by the very nation they served, then I would have some major trust issues too." he whispered back. Leone nodding in agreement.

"Just give her some time."

They jumped when Excalibur appeared in between them from out of nowhere, but instead of berating them about their discussion he placed a hand on their shoulders and sighed.

"If she told you about how her parents were executed, then you must know the whole story, right?" he asked in a low tone, Leone and Lubbock shaking their heads.

"Well…" began Excalibur before he noticed it wasn't just them two listening in, Tatsumi and Esdeath had turned their heads slightly towards him as did the rest of the large group.

"Oh don't mind us. Just pretend we aren't here." said Mine with a grin on her face, Excalibur sighing heavily again before he returned his attention to his primary listeners and began his story.

"It is indeed the truth that Maya's parents were executed. But...there's much more to it then that. Don't tell her that I told you all this, either. She's the only person to confide in me her past, so listen up, because this is the only time I'll be saying it."

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

 **\- Seven Years Ago -**

"Okay Mom, Dad, I'm heading out!" announced a much younger Maya, only 14 years old, as she headed towards the front door of her house.

"Good luck honey!" called back her mother from the kitchen while her father finished tying up his boots and stood at the door waiting for her.

"You think you can do it?" he asked with smile, Maya nodding her head a few times.

"Yeah. I've been working really really hard, and I think I can do it this time!" said Maya excitedly, her father laughing at her enthusiasm.

"Alright then, let's go."

She was on her way to be recruited into the Imperial Army, just like her father had, and what made her so excited was that overseeing the entire thing would be the Great General himself. Her dream was to join the Imperial Guard and serve under the legendary General, and so when her father dropped her off at the Imperial Training Grounds she mentally and physically prepared herself to give it her all.

 **\- Office of the Great General, Imperial Training Grounds -**

 **\- Three Hours Later -**

Great General Budo was busy sifting through the information sheets and medical reports of all the new recruits that had shown up that day, and he was mostly passing them on for further review by those under him until his eye caught something peculiar.

"Oh…? What do we have here?" he asked himself as he pulled out a pair of papers titles with the name "Maya Gleipnir" and looked them over for a brief moment.

His eyes widened and he read through the reports again, this time with a more steady gaze to ensure that what he was seeing was in fact the real thing. A tiny grin appeared on his face as he set down the paper on the side away from the others and called in an Imperial Guard who was outside his door.

A few minutes later after he had sent him off with his orders the guard returned and ushered in the girl Budo had seen in the reports, the Great General motioning for her to sit down in the chair before his desk.

"So, you're Maya Gleipnir, correct?" asked Budo, a grin still on his face.

"Y-Yes, sir." replied Maya nervously, Budo chuckling as he grabbed onto the report detailing her scores and other information for reference.

"You scored exceptionally well on everything, from marksmanship to hand-to-hand combat. Exactly how old are you?" asked Budo with the raise of an eyebrow, Maya shifting uncomfortably in her seat.

"Uh...fourteen, sir."

" _Fourteen?! She was able to outperform grown men almost twice her age?_ " thought Budo in complete and utter shock, his expression hinting to Maya that her age had definitely caught him off guard.

"Is there something wrong, sir?" asked Maya with a concerned tone in her voice, the Great General shaking himself out of his trance and grinning again.

"Of course not. Normally, with your age, I would have to deny your enlistment into the Imperial Army and have you wait another two years. However, with scores like these...I have another idea." said Budo, Maya's expression morphing into one of confusion when he set down her information and leaned back in his chair.

Maya was a little hurt by the fact that she wouldn't be able to join the Imperial Army just because of her age, but judging by the look on Budo's face she assumes that whatever idea he had in mind was even better then that.

"How would you like the become the youngest member to ever join the ranks of the Imperial Guard?"

"W-What…?" asked Maya with a stutter, her heart skipping a few beats while her mind tries to process the words just spoken to her.

"I'm asking you if you want to be a member of the Imperial Guard." said Budo again, Maya's heart leaping out of her chest when her dream suddenly became very real.

Her answer was obvious, of course. Although instead of screaming it out to the heavens, she stayed professional and gave her reply like anyone would to the highest ranked officer in the Imperial Military.

"It would be an honor, sir." she said,Budo nodding his head once before standing up and walking towards the office door.

"Very well. As of now you are now my subordinate. Report back here tomorrow at 0800 hours for personal training."

"Personal training sir?"

"Indeed. You've performed better then any single person I've ever seen before, even better then some current Imperial Guards under my command. So, _I_ will be the one to personally train you, and if you exceed my expectations...I see you becoming my second-in-command in the future."

Two years passed by in the blink of an eye, and Maya, under the tutelage and watchful eye of Budo, developed even further beyond her previous limits and was transformed into a devastating opponent and one of the most powerful and skilled Imperial Guards in service to the Empire. So much so that she was promoted to his second-in-command, just like he had promised.

" _Now that my shift is over, I think I'll have enough time to go pay a visit to Mom and Dad._ " thought Maya as she left the barracks of the Imperial Palace and left the grounds to take the short way home.

When she was around halfway there though the density of people rapidly increased to the point she could barely get through without stepping on people's feet. As she neared an upcoming courtyard she overheard some people whispering about something to do with an execution and the people involved with it.

"Apparently they were traitors to the Empire...damn, it's a horrible way to go."

"No kidding, and of course they get put on display…"

" _Just who are these people talking about?_ " thought Maya as she pushed herself through the crowd and finally arrived a clearing, and the first thing to hit her nose was the smell of blood.

She looked up and instantly she felt every ounce of her life and soul leave her body, her heart shattering into a million of bits and pieces and turning her into an empty shell. It everything just to keep herself from collapsing into her knees at the sight before her.

There were two large wooden crosses in the center of the courtyard, which has a reputation of being a place where the Empire would put these types of things on display. She had seen plenty of these and was always disgusted by them whenever she saw them, but today...it was different. The people crucified and put on display weren't just some random citizens she neither knew or cared about...it was her parents.

Tears began to stream down her face and her mind began to race at hundreds of thousands of miles per hour, trying to figure out why it was *her parents up there.

Before she could however a hand wrapped itself around her and she whipped her head back, the person the arm belonged to revealed to be Budo himself. She said nothing as he led her back through the crowd and away from the horrible sight, the Great General feeling her body shake and quiver in his light grasp.

Once they had gotten far enough he turned a corner and let go of her, Maya immediately breaking down and falling to her knees while Budo crossed his arms and waited for her to finish.

"W-Why? Why were my parents up there?!" she demanded with a croak, Budo sighing heavily.

"I only just found out, but apparently they had been tried, tortured and ordered to be executed by the Prime Minister earlier today." he said regretfully, his words like a burning hot stake that stabbed Maya and caused her to suffer even more. "Trust me, I know for a fact that your parents were good people. So for them to suddenly be executed like that...it doesn't make sense."

"What do you mean by that?" asked Maya through the tears, Budo leaning up against a nearby wall and glancing down the alley towards the main road.

"The Prime Minister has a lot of people wrapped around his finger, both political and military, and he does some highly...distasteful acts in the shadows. I'm one of the few people he can't persuade to be one of his puppets, and I despise the man for being who he is. I even promised myself that whenever I got the chance, I would remove him from his current permission and eliminate him." said Budo with a scowl, his gaze returning to Maya. "What I'm trying to say is the Prime Minister must've tried to turn your father over to his side, and when he refused...he and your mother payed with their lives."

At this point Maya had finally stopped shaking, but the tears had yet to cease and she had neither the strength nor the will to stand back up. Her life had all come crashing down, and according to Budo, it was all because of a corrupt politician's own agenda and how he didn't get what he wanted. Slowly her agony turned to rage and her fingers balled up into fists, and the Empire she had sworn to serve and protect began to turn into a monstrosity that needed to be dealt with.

"I can already tell what your planning on doing, and it's my duty as the Great General to ensure the Emperor and the Prime Minister are left unharmed...however, my own personal opinion is that the Emperor's life is more important then that man." he said, Budo pushing himself off the wall and kneeling down next to Maya with a small grin on his face.

He threw one of his arms around her and hugged her, his presence and touch calming Maya down enough to the point she stopped crying. "Whatever you do next, I will probably have to call upon the Imperial Guard to deal with it, but regardless of that I will support you."

"Thank you...thank you so, so much…"murmured Maya as she tightened her hold around Budo's neck, the Great General patting her on the back a few times before helping her to her feet and dusting her off.

"Now, I'm not allowed to tell you this, but...there's a building located near the Imperial Palace. It's heavily guarded by members of the Imperial Guard, and the reason for this is located deep underneath the building is a vault. Inside the vault are all of the unused Teigu that the Empire has possession of. I know you're strong enough so...try not to kill too many of my men."

Maya smiled and she wiped away the last remnants of the tears from earlier before walking towards the street with determination written all over her face. She looked back at Budo and winked, "Thank you again, sir. For everything."

He nod his head and she vanished around the corner, her hurried footfalls telling him she was already gone. He sighed again and began walking the other way, his arms still crossed. Seems his day was going to become a whole lot more interesting.

Meanwhile Maya had gone from sprinting through the streets to leaping from rooftop to rooftop, her house coming into a view a few minutes later. She dropped down onto the front lawn and hurried inside to get to her room and retrieve the back-up set of armor and weapons she had kept stored in her closet in case they were ever needed. She slipped on the shoulder pauldrons and chest piece, followed by the thigh guards, vambraces and boots, and when she came to the helmet she decided against it and reached over for her halberd and shield.

Before leaving, she stood absolutely still for a moment and thought again of the sight of her parents, their heavily mutilated bodies hanging from the crosses and the feeling of absolute despair that had spawned within her. Her fists shook intensely as anger and rage began to course through her veins, turning her once pure and luminescent soul into a black hole void of any other emotions except sorrow, pain...and rage. The Empire to her now was no longer a nation founded on righteousness and just principles...it was a nation filled with corruption and evil that had took her parents from her, and it all stemmed from the Prime Minister.

" _I will have my revenge. I swear it._ " she told herself before leaving the room and making her way back outside.

Budo's words ran through her mind again and instantly she remembered what building Budo was talking about, its exact location popping into her brain. She was off, leaping back over the unsuspecting populace towards the Imperial Palace looming in the distance and the building she knew would be close by. Finally, after scanning around for a few moments she found her target and stood on a rooftop directly across from it, and just like Budo had said it was heavily fortified with Imperial Guards stationed at the front entrance and around its perimeter, with some more undoubtedly inside the building itself.

Her grip on her halberd and shield tightened and she steeled her senses in preparation for what was going to occur shortly, her anger rising to its boiling point.

" _I'm sorry, Budo._ " she thought one last time before making her way back to street level and crossing the almost empty road towards the building's entrance.

"Greetings, ma'am! What brings you here?" asked one of the Imperial Guards standing next to the doors with a smile on his face.

Maya said nothing as she brought her arms around and sliced clean through the man's neck with her halberd, his blood shooting outward in all directions while his partner was left totally awestruck. Before he could react and call out for help Maya took her spear and slashed through his kneecaps, dropping him down a few feet and allowing her to jam the edge of her shield in between his helmet and chest piece right into his throat, the blow strong enough to crush his trachea.

His body crumpled to the ground and Maya approached the door, her face devoid of any emotion whatsoever as she reared her shield hand back and slammed it into the doors. They easily broke them and she stepped inside, her instincts telling her to swing to the side with her halberd. They were proven right when the leading edge of her spear plunged deep into chest of an Imperial Guard standing on the left side of the door, her hand letting go and providing extra force when she rammed her shield into the guard on the other side and knocked him up against the wall. While he was disorientated she returned her attention to the guard with her halberd embedded in his chest and slipped out a knife hanging from her hip, the blade getting stabbed into the man's jugular so she could retrieve her halberd with a slight tug.

The entire engagement lasted only a few seconds and she looked up with fire in her eyes, the Imperial Guards who were still alive inside that had witnessed the brutal attack just staring at her with mouths agape. Instead of waiting for them to respond she chucked her spear at the nearest guard and grinned when it punctured his armor right above the heart, the man falling onto his back and letting go of his weapons. When an Imperial Guard that recovered enough of his sense rushed her with his halberd and shield raised she easily sidestepped him and rammed her elbow into his jaw, her hand-to-hand combat training with Budo immediately coming into play. She dispatched the guards one after the other without obtaining a single scratch, her rampage only coming to an end when her enemies had either been killed or were on the ground bleeding and moaning in pain.

She snatched the spear of a fallen guard and approached a set of doors at the end of the entrance hall, her foot the key that opened them and allowed her to begin descending the spiral stone staircase down into the earth. She finally reached the bottom and came to a heavy iron door requiring her to turn a wheel built into its structure to open it, which she dutifully accomplished after a few minutes.

The door swung open and she stepped inside to a room consumed by darkness, so she thought to use the torch she had brought with her to examine every inch of it in search of a viable Teigu for her to use. She came across a strange looking axe and a ring, but quickly turned her attention to something else stored behind a cage built into the wall. It was a chalice marked with a unique symbol, and she could feel an ominous aura coming from within it, but whatever was inside got trumped when she felt an even darker presence come from another end of the room behind a seemingly normal wall.

It took a while but she finally found a switch barely noticeable to the naked eye and pressed it, a portion of the wall sliding open and revealing a completely different room separated from the main vault, where stored inside were things that resembled very tall human beings. Painted on the wall behind the five spots were the numbers two through six, and she noticed that spots four and five were missing their Teigu, spot three was currently occupied by a tall figure draped in a dark maroon and green trench coat, and resting before the number six was a unique looking lance colored black and purple.

" _I wonder what it is…?_ " she thought to herself as she slowly approached the lance and reached out with a hand, completely unaware of the figure standing behind her.

"Halt. State your name."

She whirled around with her halberd and struck the blade of a long-sword wielded by a figure standing at least seven and a half feet tall, and judging from his style of dress she assumed him to be similar to the figure standing in the number three spot in the room, only his trench coat was white and blue.

"If you were sent her to stop me, I won't go down without a fight." she said with a growl.

"A fight? Oh heavens no, I merely want to know your name." replied the figure with a polite accent, Maya raising an eyebrow in confusion.

"Okay, um...my name is Maya. Maya Gleipnir." she said as she lowered her halberd, the white and blue man doing the same with his outrageously large longsword.

"It's a pleasure to meet you Maya. My given name was King of Kings: Excalibur, but you can call me Excalibur. I'm a Teigu and the guardian of this vault."

"You're a Teigu?!"

"Indeed. I'm what you call a "Mechanical-type", since my body is made entirely out of machines, yet like a Biological-type I can heal myself if injured. That fellow over there in the trench coat is just like me, only his rudeness is unbearable and is in general a bother to be around." stated Excalibur as he looked over Maya.

"What's wrong?" she asked when the Teigu crossed his arms and cocked his head to the right.

"I sense turmoil and despair inside of you. Tell me young one, what's the matter?"

"Nothing. I'm perfectly fine." she replied with a scoff, Excalibur tapping his foot on the ground a few times and glaring at her.

"Is that the truth, or are you lying to me?"

"Yes, I'm...I…" she started to say before the images of her parents came rushing back to her like a torrential river, her lower lip beginning to tremble and her eyes starting to tear up. "I-I'm fine…"

Excalibur leaned his long-sword up against the wall and, before Maya's legs could give out, he wrapped his arms around her and hugged her. The shock of the Teigu doing an action so human-like caused her to gasp a little, but that emotion soon faded when she started to cry again and burrowed her face into Excalibur's chest. He held her softly so as to not cause her discomfort, but just enough to let her know that he wasn't going to leave her alone by herself in this moment of need.

"Tell me...what happened?" he asked in almost a whisper, Maya sniffling and calming down enough to speak.

"M-My...my parents, they...they were executed. They were _murdered_ just because my dad didn't side with the Prime Minister as one of his puppets."

Excalibur, due to not having a face to express emotions, was unable to show how appalled he was with the current state of the Empire. And this girl, her parents had been killed just because they didn't do what the Prime Minister wanted? It was preposterous.

"That's horrible...I'm deeply sorry that something like that could happen to a young woman such as yourself. The Empire I know would never let something like that happen."

"What do you mean…?" asked Maya.

"My role as a Teigu when I was first created was to act as the personal guard for the First Emperor himself, and I continued that job until the Imperial Guard was founded. I haven't been out of this vault in a while, and to think that this is how far the Empire I swore an oath to serve and protect has fallen, to execute a child's parents...it's unfathomable."

Excalibur let go of Maya and looked her in the eyes, past the sorrow and despair, and saw the raging inferno of hate and vengeance burning in her soul and clenched his fists. He had been made to act according to his own volition, and he was going to exercise that free will with this next decision.

"I can tell that you came down here to take a Teigu in order to get revenge, correct?" he asked, Maya slowly nodding her head. "Then once you do, let us be off. I will help you."

"You will? But don't you serve the Emperor?"

"Indeed, but I possess my own will and could act according to my own beliefs and volition. And right now, I see a young girl who needs assistance, and I cannot simply stand by and watch from the sidelines." said Excalibur, Maya smiling as she wiped away tears from the corners of her eyes and nodded in thanks.

"Thank you."

"The pleasure is mine. Now...I saw you were fixated on that lance. Do you know what it is?" asked Excalibur as he pointed at the purple and black lance, Maya turning to look at the weapon.

"No, not exactly." she said, Excalibur striding around her and coming to a stop next to the weapon.

"Its name is Unholy God Eater: Imperator, an armor-type Teigu that was constructed from the flesh of a Super-class Danger Beast known as Tyrant. It's exceptionally powerful, since it was created to counter its two cousins made from the same Danger Beast known as Incursio and Grand Chariot."

Maya barely heard what came after the first few words, because her mind was focused entirely on Imperator and the vibe it was giving off. It was dark and ominous just like earlier, and to be honest, it felt almost similar to her's. Tyrant, or whatever its name was...she could could feel it calling out to her.

"It...it wants me…" she murmured, her hand coming up with fingers outstretched.

She placed it gingerly on the handle, and in an instant, everything turned black.

A few minutes passed by and up on the surface the building had been completely surrounded by the Imperial Police and the Imperial Guard, Great General Budo himself overseeing the operation with his arms crossed and a heavy scowl on his face. He had seen the men Maya had brutally killed, and he wished that she had instead wounded them, but he didn't blame her.

"Prepare to breach the building." he ordered, an Imperial Guard beside him saluting before he ran off to deliver the General's word.

All of a sudden an explosion of dark purple energy shot out from the entrance of the building and billowed out into the street, sweeping through his men and sending chills up their spine. Been the aura reached Budo even he could feel the anger, rage, sorrow and grief contained within it.

"Stand fast!" he bellowed, his men and the Imperial Police steeling their nerves and losing their fear.

An agonizingly long few seconds passed by before they saw two dark shadows appear from within the black cloud, their forms growing more distinct as they neared the doorway. Budo's eyes widened when Maya was the first to appear from the cloud with strange looking black and purple lance in her grasp, and just by looking at it for a few seconds he guessed that she had managed to find a Teigu she connected with. Suddenly the other figure ducked underneath the doorway and appeared at her side with a huge long-sword over his shoulder. He recognized him almost immediately as the guardian of the vault, Excalibur, and if he was with Maya then that could only mean she had managed to persuade the Teigu to help her.

" _Damn...I think I trained her too well._ " thought Budo with a slight grin as Maya glared at them with a dark stare.

Her gaze finally came to rest on Budo and they looked at one another in silence, the master and student each taking a moment to say their silent apologies. Budo felt a pain in his chest when a single tear rolled down Maya's left cheek, her cold dark exterior cracking for a moment to reveal her pained interior.

"I-I'm sorry…" she whispered before bringing up the lance and stabbing its tip into the ground. "Imperator!"

Upon declaring the name of the Teigu a gargantuan ring of purple fire sprang to life around her, blowing away all the wind in the immediate area and creating a shock wave that very nearly caused Budo to lose his balance. He brought an arm up in order to see better and he gasped when a from the flames emerged the manifestation of a dark dragon, it's sharpened teeth bared at its enemies and its wings spread so far out it dwarfed the building in size. He watched in total awe as the dragon brought its clawed hands down and around Maya, the purple flames beginning to climb up her legs and cover her in black and purple armor. After her legs had been completed, the chest piece came second with the shoulder pauldrons coming after that. Finally the helmet manifested over her head and face, fully completing the set of armor and finishing the transformation.

"Out of my _way_!" snarled Maya as she formed a lance in her hand from purple fire and stormed her way through Budo's men, their weapons unable to scratch Imperator and halt her advance

Soon enough it was just Budo left standing, with the entirety of the men the Great General had brought with him lying on the ground moaning in pain from their injuries. A quick glance told him however they were going to live, which he was thankful for.

He looked back at Maya with a hard glare as she slowly approached him with her lance by her side, Excalibur a few paces behind her. Neither Budo nor Maya said anything when she walked past him without either raising their weapons to do combat.

"Maya."

She stopped and turned her head slightly to the right, giving Budo her ear to listen. He glanced over his shoulder and grinned, "Good luck."

Maya blinked a few times before nodding once and continuing on her way with her companion, the two officially turning their back on the Empire for good.

 **\- Present Day -**

"From there she created the persona of "Arius Magress" and we began to strike at the Empire whenever we could." said Excalibur to finish his epic tale, Lubbock and Leone shaking their heads in utter disbelief.

"She was Budo's second-in-command? Damn...and that was when she didn't even _have_ a Teigu…" murmured Lubbock.

Najenda looked away from the mechanical Teigu and scanned the mountain tops in the distance, looking for a specific shape that she had made sure to memorize. It didn't take her long and she pointed at a slightly smaller mountain, Tatsumi and Esdeath squinting to make it out among the rest while Najenda smirked victoriously.

"There. That's our resting point."

"What are we looking at, exactly?" asked Tatsumi. " All I see is a normal mountain range."

"It's not just some normal mountain range. This is the first of many secret bases the Revolutionary Army constructed in order to hide from the Empire, and since this base is among the farthest from the Empire we should find them still here." stated Najenda as she glanced at Run for confirmation, since the Jaeger had used Mastema to do an aerial reconnaissance of the surrounding area for any tracks leading away from the mountain.

"Yes, they should still be inside." he replied with an affirmative nod.

"Thank goodness. We might be finally able to get some decent rest." said Wave with a sigh of relief, the rest of the group following suite.

Far behind them, around five kilometers on a relatively tall plateau with his eye down range and his finger on the trigger of a drastically transformed and modified Brahmastra, was their worst nightmare. The Inquisitor had taken out the extra pieces for his Teigu from its carrying case and had attached them, increasing the weapon's power and range.

To help mitigate the recoil several braces had been added onto the butt of the gun, to increase its range the Inquisitor changed the scope extension, and to amplify its power there were several enhancer rings levitating in the air in front of the barrel about three feet apart from one another.

And for the past thirty seconds he had been holding down the trigger for Brahmastra, gathering and accumulating as much energy as he could to enact his Teigu's ultimate move...its Trump Card.

" _Forgive me._ " he thought regretfully before letting go of the trigger. " _Divine Judgement - Brahmashirsha Astra._ "

"Come on, let's hurry inside before we get noticed!" ordered Najenda as they picked up the pace a little in their horses, the entrance to the secret base coming into view and renewing their hopes.

Suddenly everything turned bright white when a massive beam of plasma, its diameter practically half a mile long, rocketed over their heads and struck the face of the mountain with such devastating power the first thirty feet of rock was instantly obliterated. They were all blinded by the enormous amount of light the beam was giving off, and only after a few seconds did it finally begin to face and show them the horror that awaited them.

The entire front face of the mountain had been eradicated as a result of the initial impact, and the heat wave generated from the beam had been so great that any plant life in the immediate area had been vaporized and turned to ash. What remained of the secret base, their salvation, was a gaping hole scorched pitch black as a result of the plasma beam with the surrounding area morphed into glass as a result of the extreme heat.

"No…" murmured Leone in utter despair as the dust clouds began to settle, their worst fears becoming a reality before their very Eyes.

"Dammit! We were so close!" cursed Lubbock angrily, Excalibur looking back at Maya and watching her activate Imperator in order to mask her appearance.

"Get ready. They're coming." she said without any emotion in her voice, Tatsumi and Wave hopping off their horses and donning their own armor.

The Inquisitor lowered Brahmastra and set the steaming rifle on the ground, his gloved hands unable to bear the heat of the overheated weapon, and looked back at the two people standing behind him.

"I won't be able to utilize Brahmastra again for a few since using its Trump Card uses so much energy. Good luck, Mistress. I will join the fight once my Teigu has cooled down."

"Thank you for your assistance, my Inquisitor." replied Jacqueline with a smile before she crossed her arms and motioned to Dreivas. "You may begin. Just leave Magress, Esdeath and her husband to me."

"Whatever. Stay out of my way and there won't be a problem." growled Dreivas as he brought a hand up and created a series of roots around himself to form a cocoon.

"Fair enough." said Jacqueline with a chuckle when a cocoon wrapped around her and pulled her into the ground, the two shooting off down through the rock and towards their targets like bullets through the air.

As they traveled through the ground Dreivas began to spread a web of tree roots through the ground around their targets, being sure to keep them low enough so as to not give away their position. When everything was set in place he gripped his staff tightly and laughed, the anticipation of battle growing inside of him like an infectious virus that threatened to take over.

"That beam must've originated from one of the two agents from the Empire you drove off, right Maya?" questioned Excalibur.

"Yes. And if he is here, then Dreivas should be as well." replied Maya, Tatsumi catching the name and wondering who they were referring to.

"Dreivas?" he asked.

"Nature's Wrath: Dreivas is the name of the Teigu that was manipulating those tree roots to attack you earlier. He's a Mechanical-type Teigu like me and has control over nature, which makes him a tricky and difficult opponent." explained Excalibur before removing his long-sword from his back and swinging the blade through the air. "I will handle him, since I know how he fights."

"There's another presence I'm sensing as well, it's...so dark and cold…" murmured Maya, her eyes narrowing.

Esdeath felt it alongside Tatsumi a second later and they both developed a scowl on their faces when they recognized their most hated enemy heading right towards them with this Dreivas character. Esdeath pulled her rapier from its sheath and she examined her surroundings, seeing a forest in the distance, the mountains behind them and then a canyon over to their right.

"It's _her_." snarled Tatsumi as Neutnote appeared in his hand, the other Jaegers tensing up with their Night Raid companions.

"Who?" asked Excalibur.

"The Great General we told you about, Jacqueline. She came here herself...dammit, I thought we could sneak past without getting noticed!" growled Wave after Akame drew Murasame and stood by his side with Kurome and Yatsufusa.

Before they could formulate a plan of action the ground a couple of meters behind them erupted and two large cocoons of roots shot out of the ground and into the air, their tips opening up like a flower to allow their occupants to leap out towards the ground.

"Scatter! Don't stop for anything! We'll meet up later!" bellowed Najenda before the entire group darted off in every direction possible that took them away from their pursuers.

Dreivas was about to take off after Run, Mine and Leone before a white blur shot up at him and swung at his head with a longsword. He brought his spear up just in time to deflect the blade and he gasped when he recognized its wielder with but a glance at his appearance.

"Long time no see, Dreivas!" said Excalibur excitedly as he hit the ground with both feet a few yards away from Dreivas.

"Excalibur…" growled Dreivas under his breath, the roots underneath his feet becoming agitated in response to his anger. "EXCALIBUR!"

He roared to the heavens as the ground cracked and split apart as a result of the tree roots exploding upwards to lash out at Excalibur with deadly force, the Teigu making exceptional use of his blade to hack and cut them apart with ease.

Meanwhile Jacqueline had followed her targets into the forest she had made note of earlier and unraveled Basilisk, the sword remaining flexible so she could fling it outwards and wrap it around a tree in order to fling herself up and over the trees. She came crashing through the brush and landed directly in front of Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya, the three jumping back at her sudden and quick arrival.

She looked up at Tatsumi and Esdeath and winked at them, "Welcome back, you two. Congratulations on your baby daughter, by the way. I hope you got my gift."

"Oh we got your fucking gift, you bitch." snarled Esdeath, her newfound motherly instincts kicking into high gear alongside her already terrifying prowess as a fighter.

"It was the thought that counts. Now, for you…" said Jacqueline before moving her gaze to Maya. "I believe you are the one who's been a pain in the Empire's backside, correct? Arius Magress?"

"And you must be Great General Jacqueline. Tell me...do you know what fear is?" asked Maya as she brought up Leomurg after creating the lance and glared at Jacqueline, her grin beginning to piss her off.

"Oh yes. Even though I've never felt it myself, I'm very familiar with the feeling of fear. The look in my enemy's eyes as I cut them apart, the sight of those I torture as they lose all hope and succumb to the pain and agony...it's so _delightful_." replied Jacqueline with a giggle, Maya shivering under her armor.

" _She's that far gone…and that killer intent of hers, it's nauseating. Compared to Budo...she's nightmarish._ "

"Well then, I guess it's time you learned. Awakening - God of Destruction!" roared Maya as she became consumed by purple fire, Tatsumi recognizing the fake Trump Card when the feathery wings sprouted from her back and blew back the wind surrounding her.

"Amazing! Such power and strength in one individual!" laughed Jacqueline in awe, her own heart starting to beat faster in excitement while Devil's Heart continued to beat steadily. "Show me why they call you the One Man Army!"

Maya clenched her free hand into a tight fist and growled, "With pleasure."

Her body seemed to flicker and in a split second she appeared right in front of Jacqueline with her arm reared back, the Great General caught off guard by the speed of her opponent and unable to defend herself. She took Maya's punch full-force in the jaw and she staggered back, Tatsumi cringing when a loud *snap was heard from Jacqueline's neck. With a single blow Maya had broken her neck and caused her head to rotate backwards almost a full one hundred and eighty degrees, the disfigured outline of her broken spinal cord poking through her skin and making even Esdeath tremble a little.

Maya waited for Jacqueline's lifeless body to drop to the ground, since the possibility of someone surviving a blow like that without armor such as her own or Tyrannus close to none. She was sorely mistaken when Jacqueline recovered her balance and stood absolutely still, her arms hanging limp at her side.

"You are certainly interesting…" said the Great General, Maya's eyes widening in shock when Jacqueline brought a hand up towards her head and grasped her chin tightly.

Tatsumi closed his eyes and looked away when Jacqueline reared her arm back and returned her head and neck to their original positions, the bones cracking as they realigned. She rolled her neck and shoulders around a few times to make sure everything was in the right spot before giggling again and flipping back her hair.

"But it was rude of you to attack so suddenly. I'm gonna have to teach you some proper manners!"

It was Maya's turn to get caught off guard when Jacqueline moved faster then her own finely tuned instincts and reactions could register and slammed her fist into her gut, Tatsumi and Esdeath gasping when shards of Imperator flew off this way and that after the impact and littered the ground around the two. Maya stumbled backwards and Jacqueline lashed out with Basilisk, the serrated teeth of the spine sword wrapping around Maya's left arm and hardening.

She pulled back and when Maya was flung right back at her she planted the palm of her other hand directly over her helmet and brought her down with such strength and power her body smashed through the dirt and ended up four feet under with a crater surrounding the two.

"That should teach y-" Jacqueline started before Tatsumi and Esdeath rushed her, the former slashing through her throat with Neuntote and spraying her blood across the ground.

When her hand flew to her throat Esdeath drove the her heel into her gut and knocked the wind out of her, the former General following up with two quick slashes of her rapier across her chest in an X-shaped fashion. Jacqueline grunted in pain, and yet she had no room to counterattack when Tatsumi came right up behind Esdeath and punched her once in the rib-cage to break some of her ribs, once in the jaw the disorient her, and then one final swing with Neuntote towards her waistline in order to cleave her half.

When the blade struck her spine, however, instead of cutting clean through like he was expecting, the blade stopped instantly and Tatsumi was left standing motionless right up against the bloody Great General with Neuntote stuck within her.

Before he could pull away she rapidly grasped onto one of the horns his armor's helmet possessed and slowly brought her head up in order to stare deep into his eyes.

"Close...but not close enough." she murmured with a smile, the gash in her neck closing up with a hiss.

Her fingers dug into Tyrannus and a spider web of cracks lanced down the horn and across the left side of Tatsumi's helmet before she pulled back, breaking off the entire left half of the helmet and revealing his shocked expression. She dropped Basilisk and pushed him back while she grasped Neuntote's shaft and ripped it out of her gut, a left step followed by a twirl sending the spear through the air and deep into Tatsumi's right shoulder pauldron. Thankfully it didn't cut deep enough to hit skin, so he leaped back to remove the spear while Esdeath filled his void and pressured Jacqueline again.

"Come on you bitch, I'm gonna cut off that head of yours for trying to hurt my daughter!" yelled Esdeath angrily as she formed a horn of ice a few feet in front of Jacqueline and forced her on the defensive, the Great General having to use Basilisk to block and deflect every swing of the rapier and frozen projectile sent her way from the enraged Ice Queen.

" _Damn…Note to self, don't piss off the wife. She is scary when pissed off._ " thought Tatsumi as he ripped off the rest of his helmet since it was already broken, which is something he had been doing a lot recently. " _I hope everyone else was able to get away safely._ "


	29. Day of the Dead

A/N I don't have much to say this time around except that the gorgeous **Maya Gleipnir** has made her appearance on the wiki alongside her Teigu, **Unholy God Eater: Imperator** , so head on down to **FanFicCollective** , which should be the first link if searched up on Google, and check her out.

And on a side-note, I'll let you guys in on a little funfact about me. Come the 24th of this month, I'll be starting my Fall Semester in college as as 17 year old. That's right people, I am YOUNG AS HELL. Deal with it. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 28 - Day of the Dead**

 **\- The Canyon -**

"Down here! We can follow the river past the mountains!" shouted Wave over his shoulder before sliding down the steep slope of the canyon, Kurome and Akame following close behind them.

They still had their weapons at the ready just in case, but since Excalibur was currently fighting Dreivas and Wave had seen Jacqueline go after Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya, he had a good feeling about their chances of getting away unscathed.

When they reached the bottom they continued to sprint along the river shoreline, the sounds of Excalibur and Dreivas' battle slowly fading away leading Wave to finally deactivate Grand Chariot and let out a sigh of relief.

"Alright guys, if we keep moving like this we'll be home free."

"Thank goodness…" murmured Akame, her grip around Murasame slackening ever-so-slightly.

Kurome was about to return Yatsufusa to her sheath before she noticed a shadow above them grow larger and larger in a matter of seconds. "Look out!"

Wave and Akame darted away from each other when a purple and a black blur slamming down into the ground where they once were, the impact spraying bits of rock in all directions and creating a cloud of dust that hid the figure's appearance.

Wave held his arm up to prevent dust from getting in his eyes and he squinted into the cloud, Akame narrowing her eyes and clenching her jaw muscles for whomever stood inside. The wind blew away the cloud and revealed their unexpected attacker to be a very tall lanky man dressed in gentleman-type clothes and a top hat on his head.

"Who are you?" asked Akame, the man cracking open a single eye and glancing at her from the side.

He removed the case from over his shoulder and popped it open, his hand reaching inside to retrieve a unique sniper rifle and bring its barrel up to face Wave when the Jaeger stabbed his sword into the dirt and cloaked himself in his armor.

"I am the Inquisitor, former assassin known as the God of Death, and Great General Jacqueline's personal attendant and bodyguard." introduced the man, his finger pressing down on the trigger of the rifle. "And this is my Teigu, Divine Heaven Piercer: Brahmastra. I regret to inform you that per my orders, I must kill you."

Before he could fire Brahmastra Akame attacked him from behind and swung Murasame in a wide arc, the Inquisitor dodging the blade without even looking at her and stepping to the side. He brought his Teigu around in half a second and fired at point-blank range, the plasma bolt narrowly missing her head when she ducked underneath it. Wave clenched his fists and assaulted the Inquisitor, but to his surprise the man easily avoided every single one of his punches and kicks until he turned the tables on him. The Inquisitor grabbed Wave's right wrist and lifted Brahmastra's barrel, a press of the trigger sending a plasma bolt through Grand Chariot's armor and out through his side.

"Gah!" grunted Wave before staggering back and putting a hand over the smoking hole the rifle had created.

"That thing broke through Grad Chariot?!" stammered Kurome, the Inquisitor grinning slightly as he placed his rifle on his shoulder.

"Not much is known about Brahmastra...but what I _do_ know is that it is the only Teigu in existence that has the penetrating power capable of cutting through even Tyrant's scaly hide one hundred percent of the time. So your armor is useless against me." stated the Inquisitor, Wave growling under his breath as he sucked up the pain.

Suddenly Akame stabbed Murasame through the man's back and out of his chest, the Inquisitor's eyes shooting wide open in shock.

"Eliminate." murmured Akame under her breath, the Inquisitor gasping when she withdrew her poisoned blade from his body and kicked him forward.

He regained his balance rather quickly and he returned to his full height, Wave, Akame and Kurome waiting for the distinctive marks of Murasame's poison to appear on his skin and signal the end of his life. But...they never came, and in a matter of moments the Inquisitor was facing them again with a slight grin on his face and Brahmastra at his side.

"Sorry, but...poison won't work on me. I have no blood left to bleed." said the Inquisitor, Akame's hands beginning to tremble in terror at the man standing before her.

Well, if he was even considered a man anymore. He was right when he said there was no blood left inside of him to bleed, since where she had stabbed him wasn't secreting any of that red liquid.

"What are you?" asked Kurome after her sister backed up next to her, with Wave standing in the other side of the Inquisitor across from them.

"I am merely a tool for my Mistress to use at her own discretion. I have sacrificed a human life for that of a machine's, by replacing nearly 90% if my internal organs with strength-enhancing devices, and my entire bone structure has been substituted with a new one made entirely of my Mistress' own bones. I am the perfect combatant." revealed the Inquisitor before he actually dropped Brahmastra, and lifted his gloved hands up, the fingers balling up into fists.

He fully opened his eyes and spread his feet apart into a combat stance, Akame and Kurome bringing their swords up in response.

"I've ended the lives of many with only my bare hands. So as a somewhat religious man, I pray that you will be able to survive for as long as possible."

As he looked from one sister to the other, Wave's mind was in maximum overdrive, trying to figure out a strategy that they could use to beat this seemingly invincible opponent. He could dodge their attacks without even looking at them and Murasame's poison has no effect on him. And if his bones were actually Jacqueline's, they would be exceptionally durable and hard to fracture, even with his enhanced strength due to Grand Chariot.

" _Fuck it._ "

He ran at the Inquisitor and leaped into the air, his heel whirling around towards his temple, but just like before the Inquisitor dodged the attack from behind and stepped to the side. Only instead of letting Wave fly past him he rammed his elbow into the Jaeger's face, Grand Chariot's armor breaking away and shattering into pieces. While he was left feeling from the blow, the Inquisitor followed up by slapping a hand into his back and pulled him down low enough to drive his knee into his gut and knock the wind out of his lungs.

To Akame and Kurome's horror, the Inquisitor dispatched Wave in a matter of seconds and dropped the man to the ground, his gaze moving to them.

"I'm sorry, but this must be done." he apologized before kicking Brahmastra up into his hand and firing a plasma bolt straight at Akame.

A flash of white and the Inquisitor had to duck out of the way of his own rifle attack when the bolt was reflected right back at him. He looked on in silence as a bald man dressed in a white suit with a grey shirt and tie lowered the shield in his grasp and stood up from his kneeling position, Kurome letting out a sigh of relief in thanks that she had summoned him in time.

" _Thank you Wall, I can always trust your shield._ "

"Kurome, who is-" Akame began to ask before purple lightning lanced across Yatsufusa's blade, her younger sister glancing at her and smiling.

"You need to get Wave out of here, he's injured and needs help. I can handle him."

"Don't say that, we can take him on together." replied Akame sternly, Kurome glaring at her while Wall took a few steps back with his shield still raised in case the Inquisitor attacked with Brahmastra again.

"You won't be able to kill him with Murasame and if his bones are the same as Jacqueline's, then there's no chance you can cut through them either. I can overwhelm him with my puppets, and since our last engagement I did a little adjustments to Wall's shield here. I changed it to also function as a mirror so he can reflect his Teigu's plasma, and that just leaves him with his fists." explained Kurome under her breath, Akame biting her lip at the confident look on her face. "Don't worry Big Sis, I'll be fine, I promise. I'll meet up with your and Wave later, what you need to do first is take care of his injuries."

Akame nodded and she returned her sword to its sheath, the Inquisitor eyeing them warily with his finger hovering inches above the trigger to his rifle. In a flash she dashed for Wave's comatose body, the Inquisitor swinging Brahmastra around to aim for her head, but when he fired Wall was there yet again with his reflective shield to cover her retrieval and escape from the area.

" _Oh well, I guess it can't be bothered with. I'll have to make it up to Jacqueline…_ " thought the Inquisitor as he looked back at Kurome, who by now had taken a few steps away from him and spread the distance between their positions.

"I won't let you hurt my friends. I'm going to kill you here and now." she said with determination, the Inquisitor chuckling lightly as he closed his eyes and lowered Brahmastra.

"I admire your loyalty to your allies. May I ask what your name is?"

"It's Kurome. That other girl, Akame, she's my older sister." replied Kurome, the Inquisitor nodding once before he bowed out of respect for the two.

"It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Kurome. Truthfully I wish we could've met under better circumstances, you all seem like a joy to be with." said the Inquisitor with a warm smile, Kurome dropping Yatsufusa a fraction of an inch.

"Then why don't you join us?" she asked.

In an instant the Inquisitor's expression soured and he opened his eyes in order to glare at her and shake his head. "I cannot. I am bound by my loyalty to Jacqueline. Her words are my orders, and I will follow them even if it means my death."

"But the Empire is evil! It took me a while to figure that out for myself, but I eventually saw the truth behind the facade and realized that the current regime is corrupted. Honest _needs_ to die!" exclaimed Kurome, the Inquisitor lowering his gaze and sighing heavily.

"I know...and I wish I could help, I really do. I live with constant regret of all of my actions that I have committed thus far...all the people I've killed, all the families I have torn apart by ending the life of a husband or son or wife, and I know that I will pay for the heinous sins I have committed some day. But the fact of the matter is that I am honor-bound to stay true to my word."

"Your word?" asked Kurome.

"Yes...We've known each other for quite sometime, my Mistress and I, and I made her a promise that I will never leave her side. I plan on keeping that promise." replied the Inquisitor, Kurome closing her eyes and thinking of her sister and the promise that she made to her sister and Wave.

"I have to keep a promise too. I'm going to meet up with my sister and friend…" she started before her sword hand rose up to the sky and unleashed a storm of purple lightning from Yatsufusa, the ground around her breaking open as the corpses under her control forced their way through out on to the surface. "So please, let me end your suffering."

The earth behind her exploded when a large skeletal hand emerged from the depths and pulled up a large dinosaur-like Danger Beast that allowed Kurome to hitch a ride on its head as it rose up to its full height. Several more corpses emerged next to Wall, one being a former assassin who dual-wielded pistols named Doha, one a former General of the Empire named Rokugoh whom had been killed by Kurome for trying to defect, and another a short and stout hooded figure by the name of Henter, who in life had been a survivor of the Ban Tribe massacre. Beside him was a Danger Beast named Apeman who, like his name stated, resembled a humanoid gorilla, and finally the last corpse to be revived from the dead was Natala, a comrade of hers in the Group of Terror.

He leaped up into the air and landed softly next to her on Desta-Ghoul, the Super-class Danger Beast she was standing on, completing her troop and bringing the odds against the Inquisitor up eight to one.

" _So this is the power of Yatsufusa...incredible._ " thought the former assassin before he removed his tophat and monocle, his eyes wide open again so he could make full use of Marginal Counter.

" _However, there is still a weakness I can exploit...all I must simply do is cut the head off the snake!_ "

He crouched down, his knee joints clicking several times as the springs implanted into his legs coiled and built up tension, before he let loose the tension and propelled himself into the air with the force of a bullet straight at Kurome.

"Desta-Ghoul!" she ordered, the Danger Beast opening its maw and aiming at the Inquisitor as a massive ball of blue energy gathering in between his teeth.

It let it loose as a devastating beam of energy that seemed the consume the Inquisitor and reduce him to nothing but ash, but Kurome was in for a surprise when the beam vanished and the man himself landed on top of Desta-Ghoul's shoulder blade. Smoke was swirling off his bare skin since all of his clothes save for his pants had been burnt away, revealing his toned and muscular, yet lean build coupled with battle scars from battles long ago. What caught her off guard were the hexagonal skin patterns stretching across his upper chest and shoulders, and that even though he had taken the attack head on there were no marks on him whatsoever implying that he had been injured.

The only one she saw was the stab wound Akame had given him earlier, the slit in his chest clearly visible from where she stood.

The Inquisitor brought up Brahmastra, which had survived the beam, and fired several bolts of plasma one after the other, Natala grabbing her and leaping off the Danger Heart's head in order to avoid them. Suddenly Rokugoh and Apeman appeared on either side of the Inquisitor, Kurome grinning as she ordered the two corpses to attack him from either side and keep him occupied while Doya snuck up onto Desta-Ghoul's head and got into a position to user her pistols.

Apeman roared before he bounded up to the Inquisitor and swung at his head, the former assassin dodging the attack and returning one of his own that would've broken a normal human's entire ribcage. However the corpse wasn't a normal human and it wasn't even _alive_ , so instead of reeling from the blow the Danger Beast pressed its assault and pushed the Inquisitor towards Rokugoh so he could begin to use his whip.

"Enough!" growled the Inquisitor before rolling away from the two corpses and firing Brahmastra as soon as he stood up, the plasma bolt shooting through Apeman's face and leaving behind a scorching hole.

Apeman wasn't fazed and rushed him alongside Rokugoh, the Inquisitor growling under his breath and clenching his fist in preparation for them before he heard the sound of footsteps behind him. He leaped up into the air before Doya could fire her pistols and he didn't even have to aim down Brahmastra's scope in order to put two plasma bolts through each of her hands and disarm her.

Kurome cursed under breath when she saw her get decapitated by a single kick from the Inquisitor and then shot full of holes, ending her undead life and reducing the number of corpses by one.

" _One down…_ " he thought with a slight grin as he turned around and stared at Rokugoh and Apeman.

Suddenly a rush of air overtook him and he grunted when Desta-Ghoul's hand smashed into his side and launched him off the Danger Beast's head, his body hitting one of the cliffside and burying itself deep into the rock. He had to move quickly in order to avoid another energy blast from Desta-Ghoul, but even then he had no room to breath when Rokugoh and Apeman appeared before him again with the intent to kill.

He glanced down once at Brahmastra and chuckled to himself, his opponents drawing closer and closer.

" _This ends now._ "

When Apeman got close enough for him to reach the Inquisitor ducked under its fist and smashed his own right into the animal's gut, the force causing its entire upper body to explode into blood and pieces of bone. He turned to Rokugoh and caught the General's whip with his bare hand, a sharp tug allowing him to draw the man in and do the same devastating attack and take another corpse out of the fight.

" _Damn, he took both of them out with a single blow each...he really is powerful._ " thought Kurome before the Inquisitor brought his gaze up to her and Natala atop the cliff across from him.

"For such a young girl you are proving to be a wonderful adversary! I'm pleasantly enjoying this fight right now!" he called out to her with a smile, Kurome returning the gesture.

Suddenly his expression softened and he lowered his gaze, his body posture telling her that whatever happened next he was regretting it already. "But...I'm sorry that this has to happen."

He brought up Brahmastra and aimed at Desta-Ghoul, his finger coming off the trigger after he had been holding onto it since he was knocked off the Danger Beast's head. The rifle let loose a massive plasma beam that cut clean through Desta-Group's chest and right shoulder, leaving a blackened hole in its wake and to Kurome's horror caused the Danger Beast to collapse onto its back and cease all movement.

Without speaking he fired it again at Kurome and just like before the bolt was redirected away from her thanks to Wall's reflective shield. Natala stepped forward and twirled his weapon, a Shingu by the name of Trisula that took on the form of a Naginata, in his hand while Kurome remained behind him and Wall.

She snapped her fingers and the famous guardsmen handed over his shield to Natala, the man grasping it in his free hand, so that he could turn and kneel before Kurome like a knight before his king.

"Thank you for everything you've done. You're free." said Kurome as she touched a hand on Wall's head, the man instantly becoming consumed with a white light as his soul was freed from its binding to Yatsufusa.

His body dissipated into tiny white particles that drifted into the air, the shield in Natala's grasp the only memento left behind of his existence. After Wall's departure Kurome stepped up next to her old friend and drew Yatsufusa, a dark purple aura to coming out of the blade when more of its power returned to it now that she was only controlling one corpse puppet.

"Just like old times, right? Natala?" asked Kurome with a warm smile, Natala slowly nodding his head.

"Y-Yes…" he spoke, which surprised Kurome since it was the first time she had heard his voice, with the last time being when he had died. "I will...protect...Kurome."

In an instant the pair attacked the Inquisitor with everything they had, Natala using Wall's shield to negate Brahmastra's plasma bolts and his Shingu's unique ability to rapidly extend its handle to keep the Inquisitor on his guard, and Kurome using her skills as an assassin to lunge at him with Yatsufusa whenever she saw a crack in his defenses. However each and every time she failed to land a blow on him thanks to Marginal Counter, which was enabling him to fight them both on even terms even though he couldn't use his Teigu.

Once he got a chance to get away from the battle he leaped back and tossed aside Brahmastra in order to grab Trisula's blade before it could cut into him, Natala growling slightly. He reared back and the Inquisitor felt his feet leave the ground as he was thrown up and over him into the air, Kurome leaping after him and swinging at his throat with Yatsufusa.

He bent over backwards to avoid the blade and threw a kick at her, the Jaeger bringing her arms up in front of her face to take the force of the blow. Suddenly Natala's blade plunged itself into the Inquisitor's side, failing to cut through his bones unfortunately, but he was still able to pull down the extended Shingu and slam the man down onto the ground with enough power to create a crater upon impact.

Natala went after him while he was down and raised his Shingu up after returning its shaft to the normal length, intending to finally bring an end to the fight by ramming the blade of Trisula through the Inquisitor's skull. When he arrived at the impact zone the Inquisitor suddenly leaped up and spun his legs around in the air, knocking the spear out of Natala's grasp sow he himself could grab it. With a single swing he literally disarmed him, the blade easily chopping off Natala's right arm, and then kicked him to the side so he could have a clear shot at Kurome. He reared back and threw Trisula at her like a javelin, the spear flying straight and true before Natala found a protruding rock and used it as a platform to push himself back into the battle and right into the weapon's flight trajectory.

It punctured his right shoulder and sprayed his blood everywhere, Kurome flinching when he slid across the ground towards her with his own weapon buried in him. He said nothing as he put Wall's shield on his back and pulled Trisula out of his own shoulder, the Inquisitor marvelling at the corpses willingness and drive to protect Kurome at all costs.

That's when it hit him. Even though this young man, who was probably just entering his twenties, was dead, he could clearly see the look of determination and undying loyalty in his eyes. All of a sudden Natala's image morphed into that of himself, the Inquisitor staring at an almost mirror-like reflection that was standing against all odds just to ensure the safety and well-being of the person he cares most about in this world.

Immediately his mind drifted back to when he was in that same position Natala was in, but instead of Kurome behind him it was a younger Jacqueline, and before him was a horde of Danger Beasts that had managed to sever one of his arms and injure him to the point he could hardly stand on his own. He took a brief glance back at her, and from the look of hope on her face he was able to gain the strength to look past the pain and continue to fight off the Danger Beasts until help could arrive.

" _Hehe...so this is how it's gonna be, huh…_ " he thought with a silent chuckle as he gripped his right wrist and pressed down on the skin, a series of clicks resonating from within before he pulled off his hand, revealing a strange device built into his arm that looked reminiscent of Brahmastra's barrel.

"Natala!" she cried out, but it came a second too late.

A bright light flashed out from the Inquisitor's arm as a white plasma beam shot out from the device hidden behind his hand, his arm sweeping to the right and sending it through Natala's legs. He collapsed onto the ground as a result of losing the limbs and the Inquisitor stride up to him as twisted his hand back onto his arm.

" _You were a worthy opponent to the very end._ " he thought out of respect before he drove his heel into the back of Natala's head and smashed it to pieces, Kurome's eyes shooting wide open in utter shock when her final puppet, her old friend, was killed a second time before her very eyes.

"Natala...n-no…" she stuttered as tears emerged from the corners of her eyes, the Inquisitor bringing his gaze back up to her and cringing when they began to burn.

" _Damn...I've overused Marginal Counter…_ " he thought before he pushed aside the burning sensation and glared at his final opponent.

"It's over."

Kurome's entire body started to shake when he slowly walked towards her, his hands clenched and ready to deliver the death blow that would end her life. The promise she made to Akame and Wave reverberated throughout her mind like a ringing gong and she bared her teeth, her will to live destroying the terror and fear gripping her heart and pushing her to new heights.

"I'm not giving in!" she roared, purple lightning shooting out of Yatsufusa and quickly encompassing the area with a dark glow that sent chills running up and down the Inquisitor's spine.

" _She still holds this much power?! Does Yatsufusa actually have a Trump Card?!_ " thought the Inquisitor when the ground began to quake and rattle, Kurome's power shooting through the roof as she gripped Yatsufusa with both hands and turned the blade around until it's blade was pointed towards the earth.

" _I've never had to use this before, but this is my only chance to win!_ " thought Kurome when Yatsufasa began to glow bright purple.

"I'm ending this now with my Trump Card! Tartarus Prison!" she bellowed, the Inquisitor's feet shifting underneath him when the ground split open and bathed his face with a reddish orange glow.

Almost instantly a pitch black hand grabbed onto his ankle and held on with a death grip, his skin crawling when he noticed the walls of the chasm opening underneath were covered with the pitch black and naked bodies of men and women who had been killed by Yatsufusa. Suddenly Henter, who had remained hidden up into this point, pounced on the Inquisitor from behind and plunged his knife into his shoulder blade, the Inquisitor grunting and falling to his knees.

He found out quickly that was a bad idea to do so when more hands from the abyss reached up to grab onto him and begin to pull him and Henter down, Kurome watching with a grin on her face at her Trump Card's success.

His waist passed by the edges of the crevasse and he let out one final yell before he was pulled under and the ground closed back up, Kurome letting out a heavy breath and dropping to her knees from sheer exhaustion.

"Hehe...I did it…" she laughed weakly, her eyes widening when she lurched forward and coughed out some blood. "I'll be coming soon Big Sis, Wave...I just need some rest…"

She let go of Yatsufusa's hilt and sat perfectly still on her hands and knees in order to let her body rest. Suddenly the ground exploded directly underneath her head and a hand burst up from beneath and grasped her throat tightly, Kurome gasping in pain while the hand's owner slowly emerged.

Her eyes widened in disbelief when the Inquisitor pulled himself out of the earth and stood on his own two feet, heavy breaths emerging from his lips due to the tiredness his limbs were plagued with.

"Good try...but I'm...not going to be killed that easily…" he murmured before he reared back and smashed Kurome into the ground, causing her to hack out more blood.

The Inquisitor let out another heavy breath and hunched over, his limbs screaming at him to rest for just a few minutes so they could recover from the strenuous fight and after very nearly being crushed to death. He finally closed his eyes to ease the burning sensation he had gotten from using Marginal Counter over an extended period of time and he wiped some saliva away from his lips.

"*In the state I'm in, I can't pursue the other two that fled earlier. Which means there's only one viable option for me to take." he told himself as he took a few minutes to retrieve Brahmastra and its carrying case.

As he was putting them all back in their proper holding compartments he froze up when heard rocks shift somewhere behind him, his head slowly turning around to face the source. Kurome had actually managed to recover from the devastating ground pound and was staring at the Inquisitor whilst breathing heavy, blood dripping down her cheek from a cut just above her eye.

The rest of her body wasn't in good shape either, and she was just barely able to stand up with the strength she had left.

"I'm not going to die…" she murmured as she brought up Yatsufusa with both hands on the hilt. "My sister...and friends are all waiting for me!"

The Inquisitor grinned before setting down the carrying case and standing up, his left hand reaching into his coat. "You are indeed dedicated to your friends, I admire that."

He pulled out a black cylinder with a golden knob on the top and threw it out to the side, the shaft extending out into a cane that he twirled around in his hands.

"It's been an honor to fight against such a strong opponent. En garde!"

He ran at Kurome and the assassin brought her sword up to block his cane, the two exhausted opponents wailing at one another with every ounce of strength they had left. Sparks were flying after every time their weapons made contact, and it would seem that Kurome had the advantage due to her wielding an actually sword when compared to the Inquisitor's cane...but that wasn't the case.

Besides being exceptional with the rifle and hand-to-hand combat, he was also well-versed in the art of Bartitsu, the art of fighting with a cane, and with this he was able to match Kurome's skill with Yatsufusa. And, thanks to the machines implanted into his body...he was slowly whittling her down with his seemingly endless reserve of strength.

The Inquisitor threw a punch at her face and she twirled around, swinging her sword as she did and catching him on the shoulder with the leading edge of Yatsufusa.

He growled a little and when she went for his throat...he brought a hand up and shocked her beyond belief. Yatsufusa's blade cut into the skin of his outstretched hand and stopped the sword halfway through when it struck the super-tough bones he had received from Jacqueline, his fingers wrapping around and gripping it tightly afterwards.

"I'm so sorry...but this must be done." said the Inquisitor before he wrenched Yatsufusa out of Kurome's hands and reared back to ram his fist into the side of her cheek, the blow knocking her out cold and dropping her to the ground.

He winced somewhat as he removed her sword from his hand and clenched his fist tightly, the cut in his skin stinging but otherwise a minor injury compared to when he had almost been crushed by Kurome's Trump Card. But, now that she was incapacitated, he could finally rest easy and catch his breath.

He raised a hand up to his ear and pressed his finger to the communicator he had placed there before he, Dreivas and Jacqueline commenced their attack on the Jaegers and Night Raid. The device crackles for a few moments before its sister holder picked up and answered back.

"Inquisitor? What's your status?"

"Fine...just a little winded is all. I was unable to pursue and kill the Jaeger member Wave and the Night Raid member Akame...but I was able to secure something else to make up for it. What of you, my Mistress?"

"A little disappointed, to be honest. Esdeath used her Trump Card so that she could flee with her husband and Magress." replied Jacqueline with a frown as she finished cooling Basilisk and clipped it to her belt. "And I think the person fighting Dreivas escaped as well, so it was a failure through and through. I *was however able to recover something of value as well."

She held up a tiny fragment of Imperator and let the sunshine off of it, the piece originating from when she had first cracked the armor. With it she would be able to analyse its origins and discover who its owner really was, since she never got a chance to see Magress' appearance.

"Shall we meet back at the capital?" asked the Inquisitor after securing some restraints on Kurome's wrists and ankles in case she woke up and tried to escape.

"That would be lovely. See you there." responded Jacqueline before ending the communication, the Inquisitor nodding his head once before he tossed Kurome's comatose body over her shoulder and grabbed Yatsufusa with a free hand.

"Time to head home."

 **\- Southeastern Lands of the Empire -**

 **\- One Day Later -**

"Thank god you guys got away!" exclaimed Tatsumi as he quickly hugged Leone, Esdeath letting out a sigh of relief when she saw Najenda among the group.

"Let me guess, Jacqueline got to you guys?" she asked after she and Esdeath embraced, her gaze going to the injured Maya who was being administered some of Solomon's Phoenix blood by Lubbock and Mine.

"Yes, and we were thankfully able to get away with my Trump Card." she replied after stepping back from her friend and glancing over at Tatsumi, who had gone over to Akame and Wave to talk to them about their opponent.

"Did you see Kurome on your guy's way here?" asked Akame after Tatsumi took a seat beside them.

He shook his head and she looked back at Wave with a worried expression, the seaman sighing heavily when he began to feel that the worse possible thing could've happened. And he wasn't the only one who noticed that she was now the last person they were waiting on to arrive.

"Wait, where's Kurome?" asked Run, the rest of the group looking around and realizing that she in fact wasn't present.

"You don't think…" started Chelsea before Akame flew up from her sitting position and glared at her.

"Don't even say it. She's not dead, I know it!" she exclaimed, Wave standing up and putting a hand on her shoulder to calm her down before things got out of hand.

"I'm sure you're right." he said, his eyes flicking over to Esdeath.

"We need to try and find her as soon as possible. Is that okay with you?"

"Of course. She's a friend and an ally, we can't possibly leave her alone." replied Esdeath.

"Agreed." added Tatsumi as he too stood up and dusted himself off before returning to Esdeath's side. "But first we need to find a more secure and defendable position to use as a temporary resting point before we head out to search for her."

"Yeah, that's a good idea. Being out in the open like this just gives me a bad feeling." said Mine with a nod, Eave looking back at Akame to get her reaction.

She lost the fire in her eyes and silently agreed to the plan, the Jaegers and Night Raid heading out immediately afterwards to find somewhere they could call home for at least a few days. They continued on from their meeting point for a few more miles, with Maya remaining in the trail position like she wanted, until Najenda spotted something in the distance that she thought would never see again. When she recognized it she couldn't help but sprint on ahead of the group, Tatsumi and Esdeath giving chase after her up a small hill.

"Wait, is that what I think it is?" asked Lubbock when he saw what Najenda had spotted, the other Night Raid members gaining new hope while the Jaegers were left confused. Tatsumi narrowed his eyes in an attempt to see the symbol on the flag the others were making such a big deal about, but it didn't matter anyways once they crested the hill and came to an unbelievable sight.

Situated in a valley beneath them hidden from sight by the surrounding rocky hills and mounds were a large amount of white tents sporting the indisputable symbol of the Revolutionary Army and the Path of Peace. And they weren't abandoned either, they could all clearly see people walking from tent to tent.

"I guess they had already left the headquarters before we got there." said Chelsea with a grin after popping a new lollipop into her mouth.

Najenda was about to motion for Tatsumi, Esdeath and the rest of the Jaegers to follow her into the camp, but she remembered that they were formerly of the Empire and that they probably wouldn't care for their company, Esdeath especially considering she was the cause for the slaughter and live burial of over four hundred thousand people in the Northern Tribes.

"Najenda, I know what you're thinking."

She jumped a little when a hand clamped down into her shoulder and she turned around, the smiling face of Esdeath staring back at her. "If they don't want us around, then we'll leave. Once you get done with your business there we can meet up with you again."

Najenda nod her head and she started down the hill towards the camp's perimeter, Leone, Lubbock, Akame and Mine following right behind her while the Jaegers, Maya and Excalibur stayed a few paces behind them.

The guards stationed at the camp's entrance noticed them approaching, and upon recognizing Najenda they instantly gave her and the rest of Night Raid a salute. When they saw Tatsumi and Esdeath however, their smiles were replaced by looks of shock.

"Are you General Esdeath? The Empire's Strongest General?" asked one of the guards, Esdeath lowering her gaze and slowly nodding her head.

"Yes, well...not any more." she replied, the guards looking to one another before the second soldier caressed Tatsumi.

"And I'm assuming you're the Jaegers?"

Tatsumi nodded, and the guards grinned at the statement for a few moments before they lowered their weapons and lost any signs of stress or worry at seeing them.

"So the rumors *we're true! You guys did go rogue and go against the Empire!" exclaimed the guard on the right, Najenda taken aback by their sudden change in attitude and looked back at Esdeath, who just shrugged.

"Hey, guys, the Jaegers are here!" shouted the other guard over his shoulder, the Revolutionary Army soldiers and Path of Peace members close by to the entrance turning and looking towards them with either a confused or dumbfounded expression.

One look at her blew hair and outfit however was enough to tell everyone staring at them that it was truly Esdeath, and by association it was indeed the Jaegers. Their arrival spread like wildfire through the camp, travelling from person to person until it went all the way up the chain of command to the surviving Generals of the Revolutionary Army.

"Sirs! I have news that needs your attention immediately!" said a soldier after bursting into the command tent in the center of the camp.

"Report." stated the leader of the Revolutionary Army, a man by the name of Thernadier.

"The former General Esdeath and the Jaegers have just arrived with Najenda and Night Raid at the front entrance, sir." said the soldier quickly and clearly, the General's eyes shooting wide open alongside his second-in-command and the other officers in his tent.

"So they finally came. I knew they would return." said a voice warmly from the other end of the tent, Thernadier looking over at its source and his comrade-in-arms, the leader of the Path of Peace himself. "Let's go greet them, shall we?"

The Lord pushed himself out of his chair and he was immediately accompanied by two Path of Peace acolytes as he left the command tent, Thernadier shrugging and following him out in order to meet the Empire's Strongest General he had heard so much about, and if she was just as horrible as the rumors said.

His expectations were completely blown away upon arriving at the camp entrance where, instead of seeing a sadistic and entirely immoral Ice Queen who killed anyone in her path, he saw a joyful and kindhearted Esdeath that was smiling and sticking particularly close to a member of the Jaegers, he assumed, while talking with the group of people that had gathered around her.

When his presence alongside the Lord's had been noticed the chatter quieted down and the soldiers stepped aside to allow them to walk up to the Jaegers directly. Tatsumi and Esdeath brightened up even more upon seeing the Lord alive and well and he returned the gesture while holding out both of his arms.

"Greetings my friends, it's been too long." he said as he shared a hug with both of them, a glance at their fingers telling him that their relationship have changed greatly since their last meeting. "And I see that you two have moved beyond your previous relationship status?"

"Yeah, we have. We're married now, and a couple of weeks ago Esdeath gave birth to our daughter in the Kingdom of Straelka, the Eastern Nation." said Tatsumi, the Lord's smile widening.

"Splendid. Congratulations to you both. When this conflict is over I'd very much like to see her."

"Thank you, and we'll be sure to do that." said Esdeath before she noticed Thernadier walk towards them with his arms crossed.

"Well...I never thought I'd live to see the day. It really is you, the infamous Ice Queen of the Empire, or I should be saying *formerly of the Empire." he said with a grin, the two of them eying him warily for a few moments before he held a hand out towards them.

"I'm glad that we're able to have you on our side now. That new Great General really put us in a bind, and I'd appreciate it if you two could tell me everything you know about the current situation going on out east."

Several hours later and after talking with both the Lord and Thernadier, informing them of the declaration of war by Straelka and its subsequent invasion of the Empire with its massive army, the strength and power of the Great General and her subordinates, and then everything else they asked about, the Jaegers were taken to their own tent alongside Najenda and Night Raid.

Once they were settled, Tatsumi and Esdeath organized a small team comprised of themselves, Wave, and Akame that would head out in search of their missing team member and friend. They all hoped that she was fine and just trying to find their way to them. It was the only thing they could do.

 **\- Capital District Building No. 23, Reconditioning Department -**

Kurome had no idea how long it had been since she had been knocked out, but as soon as her eyes fluttered open she immediately got a sense of terror when she realized where she was. She was in a dark metal box, with the only light being provided from an overhead lamp, and strapped to the walls with leather bindings were surgical tools and blades covered in the dried blood of their past victims.

She tried to move but discovered her arms and legs had been strapped down to a large metal operating table in the center of the dark box. Even with her strength she was unable to break free, and that's when she had a third realization. There was someone else in the room with her, and whoever it was, he or she was letting off an aura so ominous it was choking her and making it hard to breath.

"You're finally awake. Splendid!"

Kurome's head whipped over to the right and watched as Jacqueline herself emerged from the shadows with her black trench coat fully buttoned up and with a smile on her face. She growled at her and the Great General giggled.

"Aren't you comfortable?" she asked as she strode up to her and looked down upon Kurome, the young assassin glaring at her with such hate it could burn holes through her.

"Fuck off." she snarled, Jacqueline giggling again at her animosity.

She waited for her to say something else, but when she remained silent Jacqueline sighed and walked over to an adjacent wall lined with sharpened knives varying in sizes. "You know, you probably could've prevented yourself from getting into this situation. _But_...you just had to get in my Inquisitor's way and prevent him from doing his job."

Kurome continued to watch in utter silence as she chose a fairly large cleaver knife from the wall and flipped it around through her fingers a few times, her eyes turning back towards her with a hungry look that caused a chill to run up and down her spine. Jacqueline walked back over to her and grabbed Kurome's chin tightly, holding her head in place so that she could lean down and stare directly into her eyes.

"Believe me when I say this, little girl, any amount of pain you have ever experienced in your life will pale in comparison to the torture I will put you through. I will _break_ you, physically, mentally, and emotionally." she said with a deep scowl before letting go of Kurome's chin and turning around again, her free hand reaching up to the top button of her trench coat and unclasping it.

She continued down the line until reaching the final button and popping it open with a tiny snap, her trench coat falling from her shoulders to reveal she was completely naked underneath the piece of clothing. Kurome watched in utter terror as Jacqueline, in one swift movement, cut the strap holding her left arm and grasped it tightly as she hoisted herself up onto the table and stood over top her with a psychotic smile.

"And when all that's left of you are the shards of your shattered body, I'll put you back together again and rip you to bloody pieces over, and over, and _over_. I won't stop until every fiber of your very _existence_ is gone. You can scream and shout all you want, but no one is going to come and save you. You're all alone down here. Welcome to your own personal hell, and I'm going to enjoy watching you wither away." she said as she held the knife up to her lips and licked the blade, Kurome's entire body now quaking with fear of the obvious psychopath sitting over her.

"What kind of sick fuck are you?" she asked, Jacqueline giggling one last time before she increased her grip on Kurome's left wrist and leveled the knife in her hand.

"I appreciate the compliment, but you're only delaying the inevitable. Now...let's start with the fingers, shall we?"

Jacqueline raised the knife high into the air, Kurome's eyes widened in horror as she watched the blade fall right towards the thumb of her left hand.

Standing outside the metal box that acted as the Great General's personal torture chamber was the Inquisitor and several other torturers who had assisted in delivering Kurome to the chamber, and as soon as they heard the blood-curdling shriek emerge from inside the box they instantly shivered in dread of what could be occurring beyond the sealed door. Even the normally aloof Inquisitor shuddered and cringed when the screams became louder and more frequent.

It truly did sound like hell had just arrived on earth, and the only thing they could do was pray that it ended quickly for the unfortunate girl.

 **\- Four Days Later -**

"The blood trail leads over here!" announced Esdeath as she led Tatsumi, Wave and Akame towards a small town they had seen in the distance.

They had spotted the blood about three miles back from the town and had followed it closely, Akame identifying it as Kurome's as soon as she felt the aura rising from it. It had been four days since she and Wave had left her little sister behind so she could deal with the Inquisitor, and they hadn't heard from her since. They hoped that she was somewhere in the town and that they'll be able to bring her back to the camp with them.

" _She's got to be here!_ " thought Tatsumi as he ran up underneath a tree, thunder booming in the distance as a rainstorm began to settle in over the town.

Raindrops started to fall from the dark clouds above and Esdeath scanned the perimeter of the town, a quick order from her telling them to split up and enter the town from all sides so as to make sure they covered every nook and cranny.

Akame sprinted into the town directly from the tree while Esdeath and Wave had gone right, Tatsumi left, her mind racing to figure out the situation. " _If Kurome's been captured, we've got to rescue her. But I know that she's capable of handling herself. She might have even returned back and we just missed her._ "

She turned down another road and came to a stop, instead proceeding at a slow walk towards an empty courtyard surrounded by the faces of several buildings. Her foot hit something and she gasped when she saw it was her sister's Teigu, Yatsufusa, still in its sheath. She picked it up and continued on, wondering why her sister would leave her weapon in a place like this. From the alleyway she was in she could see people standing in front of them with looks of horror painted on their faces at something she couldn't yet see.

" _A crowd…?_ " she thought in confusion as she walked out back into the rain to get a glimpse at what everyone was looking at.

Immediately her heart stopped and her eyes grew twice their size. She felt her legs give out and she collapsed, her knees striking the cobblestone and her arms falling limp at her side. Tears began to emerge from the corners of her eyes as she took in the reality of what laid before her, the utter horror paralyzing every single muscle of her body.

Planted in the center of the courtyard was a cross made entirely out of metal, the ones used for crucifying the people Honest claimed to be criminals, with chains driven into the ground acting as its support system. She had seen plenty of these in her lifetime, with people she neither knew or cared about strapped to them, but this one was different. Instead of some random citizen who had spoken out against the Empire...it was the one person she cared most about in the world.

It was Kurome, or rather...what was left of her. To keep her pinned on the cross she had metal stakes at least a foot long driven through the palms of her hands and her shins, and to show off everything that had been inflicted unto her, she had been stripped of all her clothes and left completely naked. From Akame's perspective, her precious little sister had been turned into a human ragdoll, in every sense of the word.

Every finger on her left hand, including the thumb, had been chopped off. Her right hand had been hacked off then sewn back on, followed by her entire right arm from the forearm down getting severed, and just like the hand, it was sewn back onto the elbow joint. It was the same story for the other arm. Huge lacerations, one of the largest being at least ten inches from end to end, had been cut into her thighs multiple times then closed shut again with threads, only to be reopened again and dug even deeper until they reached bone. Spiked chains had been wrapped ever-so tightly around her left thigh specifically so the spikes welded onto them could pierce the flesh.

Like her left hand, her right foot had all of its toes chopped off, but unlike its twin the ankle must've been snapped in two because instead of hanging straight down, it was lopsided and facing the complete opposite direction. Hammered down into her hip joints were serrated spikes, with a couple also driven in between her ribs. Her abdomen must've been cut open several times as well, with several criss-crossing stitches spanning her skin like some sick and twisted game of connect the dots.

Akame's gaze lifted slightly and her heart twisted and contorted even more when she saw Kurome's face, like someone had just taken a burning hot stake and driven it through. To keep her head lifted up, barbed wire had been tied around the cross and her neck, the sharp edges digging deep into her skin and drawing copious amounts of blood. Her right eye had been completely gouged out, leaving only a bloody orifice remaining, and to finally stop her from screaming as she died slowly and painfully...Jacqueline had cut out her tongue down at the very base where it met her esophagus.

"Akame! Did you find-" shouted Tatsumi before he ran out into the square and saw Kurome for himself, Esdeath and Wave arriving soon after.

They all stood paralyzed at the nightmarish sight before them, the very thought of Kurome being dead still not registering with their brains. Just a few days ago she was alive and well, smiling and laughing and fighting alongside them. And now...she had been brutally murdered, her gentle flame snuffed out like a candle being extinguished before slumber.

Esdeath, thanks to her experience with gruesome scenes such as this, was able to snap out of her trance quicker then the others. She glanced around at the townsfolk and she drew her rapier, quickly asking, "Don't just stand there! Help us get her down!"

They were reluctant to help the former General, but a few men stepped out from the crowd and jogged over to the cross with her to help set it down on the ground after she cut the chains keeping it up. Wanting to help, Wave and Tatsumi ran over to the cross and took out the stakes driven into her limbs and body so that she could be freed from it.

Before they could do anything else, Wave and Tatsumi looked over their shoulders and stepped aside when Akame, who had finally managed to stand up, trudged past them and looked down onto her dead little sister. She collapsed to her knees again and regardless of the blood covering her body, she picked up Kurome and held her head in her arms, the tears in her eyes now freely falling down her cheeks without anything to stop them.

A flash of lightning lit up the entire town and when a deafening thunderclap echoed out from the clouds above, Akame screamed. Screamed with every fiber of her being. Screamed until she couldn't scream any more.

She clutched Kurome with a death grip close to her heart, as if she were still alive, even though that she had been long dead before being propped up in the town square. She didn't want to let go of her little sister and accept her death, she didn't want to believe that it was all real, and that in a few moments she would jolt awake in a soft bed somewhere and find her sister still alive. But no, fate was a cruel mistress...everything before her was absolutely real.

Nothing, not even the hellish training she had been put through as a child, could compare to what she was experiencing right now.

Tatsumi, Esdeath and Wave could do nothing else except watch in utter silence with the rest of the villagers as a sister cried over the brutal murder of her own flesh and blood. A sister who had finally managed to rekindle the bond they had once shared. Wave wanted to try and comfort her, but Tatsumi firmly grasped his shoulder and stopped him while slowly shaking his head.

"Don't." he said in almost a whisper, Wave looking back at Akame with a helpless expression before he clenched his fists and growled out of frustration.

"Is there really nothing we can do?" he asked to no one in particular, Tatsumi and Esdeath remaining quiet as they held hands tightly to brace themselves against the next onslaught of Akame's screams of sorrow.

 **\- Revolutionary Army Base Camp -**

 **\- Several Hours Later -**

"This storm is not letting up, isn't it?" asked Leone as she watched from one of the flaps of the tent, Najenda sitting at the table in the center with a cigarette in her mouth and her arms crossed.

Across from her sat Mine, Chelsea, Run, Maya and Excalibur, the tent they were sharing getting bombarded with the gentle downpour of the rain outside. They had been waiting for four days now for the return of Tatsumi and the others to see if they had managed to bring Kurome back, and considering how long it had been even they were beginning to have doubts. Finally, after another minute of silence Lubbock poked his head into the tent, his green hair dripping with rain water, and waved at them to follow him.

"What is it?" asked Run, the assassin's expression giving him a bad vibe.

"You all might want to come down and see this." he said, Leone looking back at Najenda, who opened her eyes and quickly went for the exit with the others.

It took them no time at all to run out into the rain and to the camp's entrance where the usual two guards stood, and what they arrived to was a sight that made them all choke up inside. Akame was walking towards them with something large, a person it seemed like, wrapped in a white blanket in her arms, Tatsumi, Esdeath and Wave a few feet behind her.

"Oh god…" muttered Najenda when she recognized the face of the individual in Akame's arms as Kurome, and judging from the large blood stains on the blanket she assumed that something horrible must've happened.

Akame herself had finally stopped crying, but her face was now dominated by an expression of total emptiness, her eyes void of any emotion whatsoever. She just stared ahead and walked forward, nothing else. A part of her had died when she saw her little sister in such a horrendous state, and it'll remain like that for the rest of her life. This would be a scar that would never heal.

Revolutionary Army soldiers and Path of Peace members emerged from their tents and watched alongside the Jaegers and Night Raid as she silently walked by without saying a word, Excalibur lowering his head out of respect for the dead while Tatsumi and company joined them and stood next to Run and Chelsea. No words were spoken. The only sound were the raindrops hitting the dirt and grass, and the occasional thunderclap overhead that signalling the death of an ally for them...and a family member for Akame.


	30. The Six Armors Series

A/N I'm so sorry, so so so sorry...to all you Kurome fans out there, I'M SO SORRY. God I feel like a heartless bastard, she died in the most horrible way possible. I'm gonna go cry in a corner, just do me a favor and leave a fav and review...

* * *

 **Chapter 29 - The Six Armors Series**

The Revolutionary Army provided the Jaegers and Night Raid with the necessary supplies to continue their journey, and when everything was all set and ready to go they left their tent to head for the camp entrance. Tatsumi looked around for any sight of Akame since she hadn't been around at all since she had returned with the body of her sister, Kurome. She had been the first to see her beloved little sister in the horrifying state Jacqueline had put her in, and after entering the camp with her wrapped up corpse in her arms, she hasn't even interacted with any of them at all. She spent all of her time at the small grave she had dug for Kurome just outside the camp, and from what they could tell all she did was take a seat before the small stack of rocks that acted as the headstone and hardly moved for the rest of the day.

Her behavior was expected, of course, any of them would act the same way if they lost a near and dear family member...but they couldn't help but worry about her health. And the person who was worrying even more so then everyone else was Wave.

"I can't stand to see her like this." he murmured as he observed Akame from afar with Leone and Najenda.

"Well, someone needs to tell her that we're going to be leaving soon." said Najenda as she lit a cigarette and sucked on it for a few seconds.

"Are you sure that's a good idea Boss? She's still pretty unstable." asked Leone in doubt, Najenda glancing over at her and exhaling a cloud of smoke.

"Do you have any ideas?"

"I'll handle it. You guys go on and head for the camp entrance, and I'll try to get Akame." said Wave with a sigh before he began to jog towards the camp's edge, Najenda shrugging as she and Leone went back into their tent to tell everyone inside to get moving.

Instead of going around the hastily built stone perimeter surrounding the camp he hopped over it and headed up the hill overlooking the back portion towards Akame, who was sitting in her usual position before Kurome's grave. He gulped a little but he hid his apprehension and approached Akame carefully, since he had no idea if she would either let him get close or lash out, until he was a couple of feet away from her.

"Akame? Are you okay?" he asked, the assassin remaining absolutely still and saying nothing.

A soft breeze blew over the hill and through their hair, Wave shoving his hands into his coat pockets and shuffling his feet slightly in discomfort. "Um...it's time to go. We're heading out."

Akame's head shifted ever so slightly before it returned to its original spot alongside the rest of her body in the fetal position, her arms crossed over her legs and her knees drawn in as close to her chest as possible.

Wave looked past her and she noticed Kurome's Teigu sitting in the patchy grass in front of the headstone, and resting right beside Akame was Murasame. He looked even closer and he saw the dried patches of blood stained into the material of Yatsufusa's sheath, his stomach doing somersaults in pity for her.

" _God...I can't even begin to imagine how she feels right now…_ " he thought to himself.

He took a small step forward and motioned with his thumb over his shoulder back at the camp, a half-hearted grin on his face. "Well, the others and I will be waiting for you at the front entrance. I'll see you there, I guess."

He took his hands out from his pockets and turned to leave, but before he could take even a single step he felt a hand slip itself around his own and hold him back. He glanced back and he saw Akame's lower lip quiver slightly, her head turning towards him and her eyes moving up to his, Wave's heart tightening at her teary eyed expression.

"Don't...please…" she asked, her voice so quiet Wave could barely hear it.

He nod his head once and walked over to her, Akame scooting over a little so he could sit down next to her. He looked at Kurome's grave marker in silence and he took a quick glance at Akame, who had returned to the fetal position but, thankfully, seemed a little less tense now that she had some company.

"I...I still can't believe she's gone…" she murmured softly, Wave letting out a heavy sigh in response.

"Me neither...she, Run and I were good friends in the Jaegers, and everyone else liked her company too. Bols, before he sacrificed himself to kill Budo, was another close friend of ours." he said, the older sister looking at him with interest since he was talking of her life while apart of the Jaegers when they were still sworn enemies.

"She got along with Tatsumi too...heh, I still remember when Chelsea was so nervous to be around her after she decided to stay with us."

Wave laughed a little at the memory and he relaxed a little more, not only because he was talking about Kurome but because he noticed Akame do the same thing out of the corner of his eye.

"But, to be honest, I've never seen her be more happier then when she finally got to be with her older sister again." said Wave with a smile, Akame's eyes widening in surprise.

"R-Really?" she asked, the Jaeger nodding.

Akame removed her gaze from him and she unfolded her legs, her eyes going to the ground where Kurome's body rested and a tear emerging from one when she smiled and remembered that day when she was able to embrace her for the first time in years.

"Personally, I'm glad that things turned out like they have, with us going rogue and eventually joining up with you guys, so that she wouldn't have to end up fighting her older sister." said Wave again before he looked directly at Akame, a hand rising up and rearing itself on her shoulder. "And I also believe that she was glad that instead of being forced to fight and possibly kill you, she was able to fight alongside you as a trusted friend and sister."

"Y-Yeah…"

"Trust me when I say this, everyone in the Jaegers is hurting because of Kurome's passing. She was our friend too, and we're all dealing with it in our own ways. I bet Tatsumi and Esdeath haven't even begun to think about how they'll tell Solomon and Camilla, our other friends, about what happened."

Suddenly he stood up and offered a hand down to her, Akame staring up at him with wide eyes. He smiled at her and he motioned with his other hand back towards the camp, silently telling her that it was time to move on.

"And I can't possibly stand by and watch as her sister grieves over her death, especially since she would probably tell you to keep going towards our goal. So come on, let's meet up with everyone else and get one step closer to toppling the Empire and returning the nation back to its kind and just roots."

Akame blinked a few times before she nod her head and wiped the tears from her eyes, Wave pulling her back to her feet when she grasped onto his hand with her own. He reached down and gave her Murasame, which she clicked onto her belt and adjusted so it was in a comfortable position, before she reached down and actually picked up Yatsufusa as well.

"Wave, I…" she started, the Jaeger running a hand through his hair and giving her a cheesy grin.

"It's fine, you don't have to say anything. I just did what I had to in order to cheer up someone that needed it." he replied, Akame closing her mouth and smiling at him.

That's when it was his turn to be surprised when all of a sudden she closed the distance between them, stood up on her toes, and kissed him square on the lips. He was totally caught off guard and he showed it through the expression on his face, which still remained even after Akame pulled away. She blushed and attached Yatsufusa to her belt just above Murasame and tapped Wave on the shoulder to get his attention again.

"We had to leave, right?" she asked, Wave blinking and coming out of his trance with a chuckle.

"Uh, yeah. Let's go." he replied, the duo looking back at Kurome's final resting spot and giving her their final goodbyes before departing.

They returned to their individual groups and Esdeath took the lead with her horse, their destination still locked on the border between the Empire and the three countries of Tesla, Delarus and Teppelin that were collectively known as the Western Nations. The capital city, New Kannath, was located in Teppelin, the farthest nation away from the border, and Esdeath had a suspicion that this was where a majority of the Hellraisers would be.

But instead of thinking on it any more, she pushed those thoughts aside for later and focused on getting to the Western Nations as fast as possible so they could lie low for a while and hide from not only Jacqueline, but from Dreivas and her seemingly invincible subordinate, the Inquisitor. What they didn't know was that their enemies were already finishing up their own preparations and getting ready to mobilize themselves.

The upcoming confrontation between the opposing sides was very near, only this time...there would be even more bloodshed.

 **\- Capital District Building No. 3, Imperial Archives -**

Jacqueline and Kahfka walked up the large stairs leading up to the front entrance of the Imperial Archives, a large building with several columns dominating its front fadon't wall and several decorative marble statues resting at the foot of the steps, with a plan to finally discover the secret behind Airus Magress and his armor.

Jacqueline pushed through the double doors and the front desk attendant looked up for the papers in front of him, a smile on his face.

"Ah, Great General, it's a pleasure to have you back. What can I help you with?" he asked, Jacqueline striding right up to him and hardly grasping onto the cuff of his shirt in order to look him dead in the eye.

"Want to tell me why I can't find anything about a certain separate room within the Imperial Vault in which I found five empty holding areas? Oh yeah, and I also want to know why there's a certain page missing from the Teigu Log Book?" she asked with a vile tone.

The man stuttered nervously when encountered with the fury of the most powerful officer within the Empire, and he glanced at Kahfka for help. Unfortunately for him she smiled devilishly and rested her arms on the desk counter' her eyes glowing somewhat when a insanely sharp icicle formed in the air next to his head.

"If you won't tell her...I'm going to make you _really_ regret your life."

A few minutes later the terrified attendant led them to the restricted portion of the archives and unlocked a heavy iron door, a rush of air shooting out from behind it as he opened it. Jacqueline made a quick glance at Kahfka before following the man into a separate room that held row upon row of bookshelves filled with documents that were too old and fragile to be put on display in the main archives, counting the numbers printed on them until he arrived at one near the very back.

He pulled a fairly large box off the marked shelf and held it out to them, Kahfka taking it from her and observing it while Jacqueline nod her head in thanks.

"I appreciate it, now run along." she ordered, the man squeamishly scooting past her and almost sprinting out of the room to get away from the two women.

"He's funny. I wasn't going to kill him, just probably cut an arm off or something." giggled Kahfka as she set the box down on a nearby table, Jacqueline sitting down with her and opening the lid.

Inside they found a stack of papers, reports from something neither had ever heard of...and sitting right next to it the one thing they had been primarily searching for. She reached inside and pulled out the missing page of the Teigu Log Book, and just like she had expected the the Teigu printed on it was one she had never heard of before.

"Unholy God Eater: Imperator…" she read, Kahfka looking over her shoulder after picking a seat next to her so that she could read with her.

"It's an armor-type forged from the flesh of the Super-class Danger Beast Tyrant…"

"Wait, I thought Incursio and Grand Chariot were the only two armors made from Tyrant. There was a third?" asked Kahfka, Jacqueline shrugging her shoulders.

"I guess so." she replied before continuing on with the description of the Teigu. "Imperator was created with the goal of being a counter to Demon Armor: Incursio and Carnage Incarnate: Grand Chariot in the event either fell into the wrong hands."

She turned the page over and grinned at the sketch and overview of Imperator's appearance, a mere glance being the only thing she needed to confirm that this as the same armor Magress was wearing when she fought him.

"So Magress was indeed using a Teigu...I wonder how he was able to come across it…"

While she was trying to think of a possible way the One Many Army gained possession of Imperator, Kahfka delved into the stack of papers that was in the box and looked through them, her eyes widening in surprise. She tapped Jacqueline on the shoulder and the Great General peeled her eyes off the page in order to look at the report when she handed it to her.

"This may answer your question." said Kahfka after handing the papers over, Jacqueline scanning the first page and instantly recognising the handwriting as that of the deceased Great General Budo.

She moved on to the next page and continued to read further and further into the report, and slowly her lips curled up into an evil smile when all of the secrets of the man known as Arius Magress came pouring out, along with a revelation that finally revealed the true identity of the infamous One Many Army. After she finished she set the papers down and laughed, Kahfka raising an eyebrow in anticipation.

"Well? What was it about?" she asked, since she had only read the first few words.

"Seems our dearly departed Budo had a close eye on Magress even before his rise to fame as the One Many Army. In *fact, the Great General actually knew him." said Jacqueline as she leaned back in her chair and looked at Kahfka's barreled expression.

"Really? Budo knew him?"

"Yes, but, I should say that Magress actually isn't a "he", and that Arius Magress isn't "his" real name at all." followed up Jacqueline with another laugh.

"What do you mean?" asked Kahfka.

"Turns out the person under the armor is actually a woman by the name of Maya Gleipnir, and that at only the age of 14 she was admitted into the Imperial Guard and trained personally under Budo for two years. She was even promoted to his second-in-command, and this was all without her possessing a Teigu."

"What happened after that? She must've done something to make her an enemy of the Empire."

"Well, there's more to it then that. Turns out her parents were executed by the Prime Minister for not joining his side and becoming one of his puppets, and in a fit of rage she attacked the Imperial Vault and stole Imperator for herself as well as the vault's guardian, Excalibur, which is Dreivas' brother, so to speak." said Jacqueline in surprise.

"She actually broke _into_ the vault? She's that strong?" asked a baffled Kahfka.

"Yes...when I first encountered her she let off an enormous amount of power and rage and attacked me. If I didn't have Devil's Heart as my Teigu I would've easily been killed by her from the single pinch she gave me." replied Jacqueline as she rubbed her left cheek, the feeling of the devastating punch still lingering somewhat even though the fatal injury had healed.

Now that they had seen what they had come there for, instead of returning the items to the box they came from, Jacqueline folded up the page for Imperator as well as Budo's report and stashed them within one of her trench coat's pockets. Kahfka caught on and she closed the box and returned it to its spot of the shelf, like nothing had been taken out of it in the first place.

They exited the separate room and made their way to the front, Kahfka giving a wink and an air kiss the attendant before they left, stepping back out into the sun and stopping at the top of the steps to figure out their next move.

"So, now what do we do Jacqy?" asked Kahfka, grinning when Jacqueline glared at her.

"I told you not to call me that. I don't like nicknames."

"Oh come on...it's funny." giggled Kahfka as she lightly elbowed her in the arm, Jacqueline rolling her eyes and sighing. "Something wrong Jacqy? Hm? Anyone home?"

Unable to stand her teasing any longer Jacqueline suddenly whirled around and maneuvered her foot behind Kahfka's, a light push sending her over head over heels and down into her arm, where Jacqueline caught her off guard and passionately kissed her. Her eyelids fluttered and she accepted the act of love by intertwining her hand with Jacqueline's and remaining perfectly still so she could finish.

Once she did she was pulled back onto her feet and they separated, both women developing blushes as a result. "Please, don't call me that."

"O-Okay." said Kahfka with a stutter as she adjusted her own trench coat, which was exactly like Jacqueline's in design. "Sorry, I'm just a really happy mood today."

"Why's that?" asked Jacqueline when they began their descent down the steps.

"Well, um...before meeting up with you I went to go pick something up that I had ordered a few weeks ago, and it has me all giddy." explained Kahfka with a smile, Jacqueline raising an eyebrow out of intrigue for the object as they stopped at the bottom of the steps

"Oh? What would that be?" she asked, Kahfka's blush getting worse while reaching into her coat's pocket and grabbing something small.

"I...I don't really know how to put this, but…" she said nervously, her hand bringing the object from the confines of her coat out into the sunlight.

Jacqueline was thrown completely for a loop when she saw what rested in the palm of Kahfka's hand, with butterflies instantly appearing in the pit of her stomach and a warm feeling overtaking her chest, and she had to keep herself from collapsing when her legs lost all of the blood in them. It was a small maroon box engraved with a symbol she didn't recognize, but she didn't care because what she saw inside after Kahfka opened it caught all of her attention.

"Um, Jacqueline, I…" she started before Jacqueline pressed an index finger to her lips, cutting her off.

"You don't have to say anything else." Jacqueline said quietly, Kahfka becoming worried for a moment until she saw a single tear emerge from the corner of her eye as she smiled. "Because my answer is yes."

Kahfka's heart skipped a beat and she felt as if her entire body suddenly got lifted away by Cloud Nine, and she expressed so much that Jacqueline giggled and had to use both hands to keep her standing.

"Y-Yes?"

Jacqueline nod her head as she removed her hands from her shoulders and wrapped Kahfka's around her waist, saying, "Of course, dummy. It would mean the world to me if you were to become my partner."

She leaned in and kissed her again, Kahfka closing her eyes and tightening her arm's hold around Jacqueline's waist. After a few seconds of brief intimacy they parted and Kahfka removed the diamond-studded ring from its box and slipped it onto Jacqueline's ring finger, solidifying their engagement and setting the course for their eventual marriage.

 **\- Capital District Building No. 23, Reconditioning Department -**

"Are we ready to depart?" asked Dreivas with a glance at the Inquisitor once the former assassin had finished putting on his new set of clothes, which was the same as his previous set that had been destroyed during his brawl with Kurome.

The only difference was that these new clothes were largely white with black, the interior of his coat and bowtie being a dark maroon, and his normally white gloves had switched to pitch black. He placed his top hat in its rightful spot and turned to face Dreivas, the carrying case for Brahmastra slung over his shoulder.

"Indeed. You have their position?" he replied, the Teigu nodding.

"I can perfectly sense the spore that I planted on Excalibur. We'll easily catch up to them."

The Inquisitor grinned as he left Jacqueline's personal chamber and walked with Dreivas to the torture chamber's exit with their wits about them. This was going to to be final confrontation in which they would hold nothing back and attack their enemies full force, the do or die moment. Their enemy would definitely have the numerical advantage, but the Inquisitor had taken on Kurome and the entirety of her corpse puppet force single-handedly and won, and they had also discussed the matter of Dreivas and his Trump Card which the Mechanical Teigu had said was extraordinarily powerful. Whatever it was, combined with Brahmashirsa Astra, would prove to be a terrifying combo.

Waiting outside for them were two platoons of Faceless that the Prime Minister had loaned to them on call from Jacqueline, the ceremonial robes they wore now switched over to battle armor that gave them the appearance of demons. The Inquisitor looked over them for a few moments before he snapped his fingers, the Faceless stiffening up.

"We are undertaking a mission given to us by my Mistress, the Great General herself. You are the best of the best of the Imperial Military, the personal protectors of the Prime Minister and Emperor. I have no doubt in my mind that you will do them proud." proclaimed the Inquisitor before he turned to Dreivas and nod his head.

Dreivas lifted his free hand up and just like with Jacqueline several roots emerged from the ground and wrapped around the Inquisitor, the Faceless, and finally Dreivas himself. They sunk under the earth and they shot off like bullets, the Teigu leading the way since he could sense where their targets currently were.

" _I'm coming for you Excalibur...and this time I will destroy you!_ "

 **\- Western Lands of the Empire, 100 miles out from Border -**

 **\- Four Days Later -**

Excalibur glanced at Wave, Tatsumi and Maya and he couldn't help but chuckle to himself, which ended up drawing the attention of Esdeath when she heard him.

"Something wrong?" she asked, Tatsumi turning to look at him with her.

"No, it's just that I'm astounded to see four Armors here all at once. I thought I'd never see the day."

"What do you mean by "Armors"? You mean our Teigu?" asked Wave, referring to Grand Chariot, Tyrannus and Imperator.

"Yes, actually, I am. Maya you may want to listen too because what I'm about to tell you is probably one of *the most well kept secrets of the Empire, going back all the way to the very creation of myself and the 48 Teigu." said Excalibur, the entire group now turning to him to hear the story he was about to tell.

"Okay, we all know and understand that Tyrannus, Grand Chariot and Imperator are all interconnected due to the fact they were crafted from the flesh of the same Danger Beast, the Super-class named Tyrant. Correct?" he first asked, a nod from everyone listening allowing him to continue. "Okay, well...what if I told you that there's more to it then that?"

A tense air of silence and intrigue dropped over the group when they were encountered with the ominous question. There was a whole other factor that connected the three armors together, and there really was one, what could it possibly be?

"When the First Emperor came up with the idea of the Teigu, he specifically ordered that the first six to be constructed were to be used by his personal guard and of course, himself. He wanted them designed in a way that they would act as the defenders of justice, with impregnable defenses and overwhelming attack power. So, a brilliant scientist came up with the idea of creating the Six Armors Series, with the first being a suit of armor that could only be wielded by the Emperor himself if the Empire was in grave danger."

"Do you know what this First Armor is?" asked Najenda.

Excalibur nodded and sighed. "Unfortunately I do not. To safeguard its existence the First Emperor wiped my memory along with Dreivas of its existence."

"You talk like Dreivas is more then just the same type of Teigu as yourself. Want to explain?" questioned Lubbock, Excalibur turning his gaze to him.

"He is indeed more then just another Mechanical-type Teigu. He _is_ Armor No. 3, after all."

"He's the third armor?!" exclaimed practically everyone.

"Then...that means the second is…" murmured Chelsea before Excalibur chuckled and pulled out the tie around his neck from underneath his trench coat, a large black number one printed onto its fabric.

"Allow me to to tell you _full_ name. I am King of Kings: Excalibur, designated No. 2 of the Six Armors Series. I was constructed by the First Emperor to not only serve as his personal guard, but I was built with extra programming to allow me to act of my own volition and not as some servant." he proclaimed with great pride, his audience totally floored at this new revelation.

Even Maya, who had been with Excalibur since age sixteen, had no idea about his true origins other then once being the personal guard of the First Emperor, so all of this information he was revealing was completely new to her.

Excalibur waited for it all to sink before continuing, this time pointing to Tatsumi, Wave and Maya with a single finger. "Moving forward, once Dreivas and I were created, the scientist in charge of the series moved onto an entirely new material, one of a more _organic_ nature."

Tatsumi's eyes widened and he glanced at Wave, who had the same expression painted on his face.

"Hold on, are you saying that Tyrannus, Grand Chariot and Imperator are all part of this Six Armors Series?" asked Leone, the Mechanical Teigu nodding.

"Yes. To be specific, Tyrannus was forged as Armor No. 4. Grand Chariot as No. 5, and Imperator as No. 6, the final armor in the series." he explained before staring directly at Tatsumi and the tattoo on his hand. "And for some reason, I can't remember why but...there was something else about your armor, Tatsumi, something that made it special among the other six."

Tatsumi held his hand up and glared at the tattoo intensly, wondering just how was his Teigu special when compared to the others. Was it because it could evolve over time and get stronger, just like Tyrant? If it wasn't that, what what _could_ it be?

"Sorry to interrupt the chat, but to be honest I was getting a little bored."

They whirled around with their weapons drawn to face the two people they had been fearing to meet ever since Akame had brought back Kurome from her horrifying fate.

Standing a few meters away from them were Dreivas and the Inquisitor, the latter cracking open an eyeball and staring at Akame after recognizing her as Kurome's sister. They had caught up to them, even when they were so close.

And to make it worse, Esdeath could sense the presence of several other people surrounding them, and just from these she deduced they had brought some of the Faceless with them in order to overwhelm them.

They were trapped, with no way out other then to fight for their very survival.


	31. The King of Kings

A/N Round 3 is about to begin, everyone. In the blue corner we have the Jaegers, Night Raid, Excalibur and Maya. In the red corner, the Inquisitor, Dreivas, and a detachment of the Faceless. Who will the victors of this ultimate battle royale be? Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 30 - The King of Kings**

The Inquisitor cracked his knuckles and rested his eyes on the person he remembered as Akame, Kurome's older sister that she had mentioned during their fight. "Ah, you must be Akame, Kurome's sister. It's a pleasure to meet you again."

Akame's grip tightened around Murasame to the point her knuckles turned white, her arm starting to shake from all the built up tension. Her glare was so intense it could've burnt holes through his head, and he could clearly see how much pain was coursing through her at seeing her little sister's killer, albeit indirectly.

For just a moment, it was just them. No one was around, the world was empty.

"Listen, Akame...I'm sorry for what happened to your sister, I really am. I was just following orders." he said regretfully, Akame lowering her head and hiding her eyes behind her bangs.

"You...I'm going to bury you for killing my little sister…" she said, her hand slowly drawing out Murasame from its sheath and letting loose a killer intent so insidious and dark that it rivaled even Jacqueline's.

She pointed the blade at the Inquisitor, a fierce wind picking up around her along with the ominous aura of her demon blade. Tatsumi, Esdeath and everyone around her got chills up and down their their spines as she set her sights on the Inquisitor, her assassin instincts taking control.

"She was the only family I had left, and you took her away from me!" she snarled, the Inquisitor closing his eyes and sighing.

"If I am to die on this day, then I shall accept that fate gladly. After all the sins that I have committed on this earth, I deserve righteous punishment." he said before he brought around his carrying case and retrieved Brahmastra from inside, the rifle already equipped with the necessary components to upgrade it into its second, more powerful stage.

"However, I _will_ not abandon my Mistress, and I _will_ fight to my dying breath so that I may continue to be by her side. So then...let us see who shall be the victors of this final confrontation!"

As soon as the finished his declaration, Dreivas crouched and slammed his palm onto the ground, the earth and dirt cracking and splitting apart to create an insanely deep hole that instantly swallowed up Excalibur and sent him down into the depths to somewhere unknown. Dreivas then called out to the second pair of roots he had created and lifted his entire arm up, Tatsumi and company very nearly losing their balance when the rock they were standing on plus about four acres worth was suddenly broken off and raised up into the sky by titanical roots drilled into its bottom.

Higher and higher they went until the Inquisitor and Dreivas were but mere ants below them, and once they finally stopped moving Tatsumi, Wave and Maya donned their armor in preparation for the arrival of one of the two. On the ground, the Inquisitor glanced at Dreivas once and nodded before he leaped up to meet the Jaegers and Night Raid, the Mechanical Teigu instead wrapping himself in roots and diving back into the dirt to meet his opposite in the special arena he had prepared just for them.

As soon as he broke through bedrock the cocoon he was within launched headfirst into a wide-open cavern he himself had dug out on the way here based upon the position of Excalibur and the others, with its ceiling at least a thousand feet tall at its highest point. When he emerged from his cocoon his opponent was already waiting for him a few meters away, his longsword at his side and ready to be used.

"Now that you can't escape, I can finally destroy you." said Dreivas arrogantly as he pointed his spear at Excalibur, the white knight glaring at him and remaining silent.

"What, you have nothing to say? No chivalrous response or sly remark?" questioned Dreivas when they began to walk in a circle, their eyes remaining locked on one another.

"This is wrong, we shouldn't be fighting. You and I used to be brothers, comrades in arms. And now look at you...serving a psychopath who takes pleasure out of killing innocent people." said Excalibur in a low tone, Dreivas growling at him under his breath.

"Shut your damn mouth, I don't serve that woman. I only serve myself!" shouted Dreivas angrily.

"That's not what it looks like to me, considering you're working with her subordinate. If you really aren't serving her, then stop this insanity and help us!" replied Excalibur.

Dreivas snarled and his power flared around him, Excalibur's trench coat flapping behind him as a result of the wind. Things were going downhill fast, and he wasn't sure if he could talk himself out of this situation any more.

"You want to hear insane? After we were made I was already stronger then you! Hell, I had a fucking Trump Card and you didn't! And yet, the First Emperor chose you over me to be his personal bodyguard!" he bellowed as he swept a hand to the side, Excalibur having to dive away when several roots bristling with razor-sharp spines erupted out of the ground where he used to be standing.

"Dammit, Dreivas, stop this madness! I don't want to fight you!" pleaded Excalibur, but his cry fell on deaf ears.

"Because of _you_ , I was locked away for a thousand years! I was left to rot!" the angered Dreivas snarled as he created another swarm of tree roots, Excalibur again leaping away to safety.

He looked at his old friend and after attacking him twice, he finally came to the conclusion that there was no hope left in redeeming him. His anger and rage had consumed and corrupted his mind, turning him into a senseless brute that only craved his destruction. He was too far gone...which left him with the only sensible thing to do.

"Very well, my old friend…" said Excalibur sadly as he stood up from his crouched stance and pointed his blade at Dreivas, his mind now made up. "If you won't listen to reason, then I will have to kill you to remove the threat you pose to my friends and allies."

Dreivas stared at him for a few seconds before he busted out laughing, the bedrock underneath his feet groaning as the tips of several tree roots poked through and began to spiral upward.

"You can try all you want, but nothing can stop the force of nature! I'll destroy you here and now for everything that you've done!"

Suddenly Dreivas shot forward with unimaginable speed and he lunged at Excalibur with his spear, a quick parry with his sword pushing it away and giving him the opportunity to aim a punch at his opponent's head. His fist struck a root grown out of Dreivas' shoulder and he growled, retreating afterwards to rethink his strategy.

"Weak, weak, weak! I want you to show me the reason why you were chosen over me!" roared Dreivas, the ground erupting once more as three massive tree roots rose up and rocketed towards Excalibur.

He chopped the first in half, sidestepped the second, and he would've been able to block the third if it wasn't for a hidden fourth one shooting up from underneath his own feet and socking him in the jaw. The third root smashed into his body and took him all the way to the far end of the cavern, ramming him into the bedrock wall and causing severe damage to his limbs that left him unable to walk.

" _This form won't work, I need to change!_ " thought Excalibur quickly as he dropped to his knees when the tree root retreated, Dreivas glaring at him.

"I don't care how long it takes, but I will pummel and rip your body to shreds until I can step on your core myself and end your miserable existence."

"Sorry, old friend, but that's where I draw the line." replied Excalibur with a laugh as his body finished repairing itself and he returned to his full height, his gaze set on Dreivas and the roots surrounding him. "Sword of Madness - Arondight!"

A purple light appeared around him and Dreivas had to hold up an arm in order to avoid being blinded, Excalibur's body slowly transforming as a result of the technique. His white and blue trenchcoat morphed to a dark purple and red, his appearance changing from knightly and royal to a more sinister and evil one, with even his eye color morphing from yellow to red. When the light vanished, Excalibur swung his sword through the air and glared at Dreivas, who could already tell that this wasn't the same Excalibur from before.

This was the first of three forms he could transform into, named Raving Madness - Arondight, which after completion grants him extraordinary attack power and speed. Undoubtedly this was his most powerful form out of the three, yet it was also his least used.

"I've never been driven to use this before, but this situation calls for it. Prepare yourself, Dreivas! I'm not holding back!"

" _He was holding back?!_ " sputtered Dreivas in his mind before Excalibur vanished in the blink of an eye, reappearing a second later just a few inches away from him.

He just had barely enough time to deflect Excalibur's longsword, the sharpened blade scraping by mere inches away from the side of his face. He twirled around and went to ram his elbow into Excalibur, but instead of hitting its target a whoosh of air rushed past him, and to his shock his arm kept going forward even though he was standing still.

"You bastard!" snarled Dreivas at the loss of his arm, Excalibur saying nothing as he reared back with his other hand and clenched his fingers.

He threw a punch at Dreivas' chest with knowledge of the exact location of his opposite's core, intending to rip it out of him so he couldn't repair himself. It would bring the fight to an end in a matter of seconds, but, at the very last moment...he hesitated. Excalibur rammed his hand through Dreivas and out of his back, mere centimeters away from the heart-like core built into his body.

"Khehehe...I knew you didn't have the guts to kill me…" laughed Dreivas before he grew several razor-sharp tree branches out of his chest and impaled Excalibur through his shoulders, chest and thighs. "You still think you can talk me out of this? Haha...that mistake will cost you your life."

"Not likely."

All of a sudden another burst of energy came from within Excalibur, shattering the branches stabbed through his body and launching Dreivas back several meters. The holes created by the branches were instantly repaired, the same thing happening to Dreivas' severed arm, and Excalibur sighed heavily again berated himself for hesitating at such a crucial moment.

" _He's too far gone...he's no longer the Dreivas you once knew._ " he told himself as he raised his longsword and rested the blade on his shoulder, images of Maya and his new friends and allies appearing in his mind. " _You have new friends that you must protect. Dying here would be an insult to them! You must survive!_ "

Suddenly, upon saying those specific words, something in the back of his mind clicked and almost immediately he was overwhelmed with an influx of memories he had never seen before. There were people and names he didn't recognize, places he thought he had never been to...and then came a face he recognized instantly as the First Emperor's.

" _Arthur!? Arthur!_ "

" _Arthur…?_ " thought Excalibur, confused as to who this Arthur person could be.

" _Come on Arthur, you need to get up! You must survive!_ "

Excalibur gasped, and everything became perfectly clear.

 **\- One Thousand Years Ago -**

Before the Empire, the Western Nations, and the Northern Territories, there was only wide open land dominated by dozens upon dozens of small kingdoms ruled by Kings and Queens that hardly spoke to one another on peaceful terms, and would constantly wage war to gain land and resources.

Within these feudal lands, however, existed a relatively large nation founded upon the principles of justice, compassion and trust named Avalon, and it was ruled by a kind leader known to all of his subjects and the lands beyond as the King of Kings. His people loved him, and in return he did as well, treating each and every single man, woman and child as a member of his own family.

His kindness was so renowned that he had no enemies to worry about, and that he and his country never suffered through a terrible war. A reputation such as this, coupled with the constant fighting going on outside around them, led to the almost daily discussion held by the King and his little brother, one of his must trusted advisors, within his personal chambers.

"Come on Arthur, think about it. If we unify the kingdoms into one large nation, there would be no wars! And with the army that we'll form out of it, no one would try to fight us!" said the King's brother as he paced from one side of the room to the other, his brother watching him from a nearby chair.

"I understand where you're coming from, I too desire peace for all. but can you be so sure that the other rulers will agree? Alekzandar?" asked Arthur, his brother looking over at him and grinning.

"They have to. If they rebel against us with force, then we'll have to respond in kind. I just don't want to see any more innocent people die." replied Alekzandar, Arthur closing his eyes and shaking his head while chuckling.

"I swear...sometimes I wonder how we're twins…" he mumbled to himself before standing up from his chair and reaching for his crown, which was resting on a table a few feet away from him. "Very well. Let us go, my brother."

"What? Where are we going?" asked Alekzandar as he followed Arthur to the door, the King looking back at him over his shoulder and winking.

"We're going to make history."

And so, on that day, the King of Kings sent out messengers across the land, proclaiming to all that he, with a desire to bring forth an abrupt end to the endless fighting that has been plaguing their lands for so long, wants to unite the far-flung kingdoms and territories with his own nation of Avalon and created an entirely new nation founded upon the principles his own was built upon.

Expecting little to none of the nations were going to join him, both he and his brother were utterly flabbergasted when Kings, Queens, Lords and Ladies from across the land came to his doorstep and pledged themselves to him and his noble cause. They came in waves, and the King could do nothing but smile and show them his thanks and hospitality by letting them keep their titles and lands. Soon enough, with the influx of people and massive growth of Avalon, it was decided among Arthur, his brother, and his new friends and allies, that to finalize the construction of their new nation, the Empire it was named, Avalon itself would be transformed into the Imperial Capital, with Arthur's own palace acting as the Imperial Palace.

In a matter of weeks, the two brothers' dream became a reality when the Empire, with its capital city founded, became a full-fledged nation that stretched across the land. And to top it all off, the people chose King Arthur to relinquish his position and title as King of Avalon... and instead become Arthur Pendragon, First Emperor of the Empire.

Of course, there were those that disagreed with their ideals and challenged their authority, forcing Arthur and his brother to utilize the massive army they now possessed after assimilating Avalon's with all of the rest that had joined the Empire. Like a tidal wave they swept across the land, conquering the rebellious kingdoms who would rather wage war then promote peace and assimilating their territories and weary people into the Empire, where they soon realized that it was just as prosperous and wonderful as they heard.

Soon after the Empire's creation, the lands to the west organized themselves into the Western Nations of Tesla, Delarus and Teppelin, and then to the north the Northern Tribes were born, and they both shared ties with the Empire and traded almost constantly.

"I can't believe it...it's actually become real." murmured Arthur as he looked out over the rapidly growing Imperial Capital, his brother standing right next to him with a grin on his face.

"Indeed, my brother. It's a wonderful thing to such peace and prosperity throughout the land. And it was all thanks to us."

"Yes...now all we must do is deal with those Danger Beasts." replied Arthur before one of his aides approached from behind and bowed, the two brothers turning to hear what she had to say.

"Your Highness, I've gathered the people you requested for the team in the Throne Room."

"Thank you. I'll meet with them now." replied Arthur before he and Alekzandar strode past her away from the balcony.

They delved back into the depths of the Imperial Palace, walking through the winding hallways past dozens of rooms, until Arthur pushed open the doors of the Throne Room and stepped inside, a group of five men and women turning towards him with smiles on their faces.

"Greetings, your Highness." spoke the man standing at the head of the group, Arthur guessing that he must be the leader.

"Welcome, welcome. It's a pleasure to have you all here. Now, I'm assuming my aide told all of you why you were called here?"

"Yeah, we're hunting down a Danger Beast, right?" asked one of the females in the group. Alekzandar nodding.

"Indeed, but this isn't any ordinary Danger Beast. According to our reports there are several of those creatures out there that are highly dangerous and exponentially more powerful then some of the ones we've all encountered. If they fit into this category, then a Danger Beast is classified as a "Super-class"." he stated as he crossed his arms

"And the Danger Beast we shall be hunting down is one of these Super-class creatures. It is a dragon known only as Tyrant, and we gathered you, the strongest warriors within the Empire, in order to subdue him." finished Arthur, another member of the assembled group placing a hand on his hip and raising a hand.

"So what makes this Tyrant guy so special?" he asked, Arthur fixing his gaze on him and crossing his arms.

"Tyrant, unlike other Danger Beasts...has an aptitude to evolve itself in order to adapt to different environments and to combat difficult opponents."

 **\- One Week Later -**

 **\- Marg Plateau -**

"Damn, he's escaped! We can catch up to him if we hurry!"

"Wait! The Emperor, he's been injured!"

"What?!"

"Arthur!? Arthur! Come Arthur, you need to get up! You must survive!"

They traveled as quickly as they could back to the Imperial Capital, Alekzandar carrying his grievously injured brother on his back as he sprinted ahead of the group. They finally got to the city and Alekzandar wasted no time in getting to the nearest hospital while avoiding any crowds to not cause panic to arise from the general populace. Arthur was admitted almost instantly and while he was being hooked up to life support machines, a man with messy dark purple hair dressed in a long white lab coat and a grey turtle neck stepped into the room.

"Excuse me but who exactly are you?" asked one of the doctors, Alekzandar standing up and looking at the man with a hard gaze.

"I'm probably the only man in this entire city that can save the Emperor. The name's Reeze, one of the scientists his Highness brought to the capital to help construct the Teigu." said the man quickly without messing up a single word, his eyes darting over to Arthur and then to Alekzandar. "I can already tell from his injuries that he won't live to see the end of today. We must act fast."

With that he motioned to something outside the large room and several men wearing lab coats began to enter the room with all sorts of equipment and tools, some the Doctors and Nurses hadn't even seen before.

"What are you going to do? Will my brother be okay?" asked Alekzandar, Reeze glancing over at him and grinning softly.

"You're his twin brother, correct? Alekzandar Pendragon? To answer your questions, I am currently the top scientist working on constructing the first six Teigu I collectively call the Six Armors Series, and I just recently finished the first of the set. With the next two I have in mind, with the technology I plan to use in their creation I will save your brother's life. I assure you, I will accomplish this task."

Alekzandar stared at the scientist for a few more seconds with a wary eye until he sighed and nod his head, Reeze turning and reached a hand out for one of his colleagues to place gloves into it. He snapped them on and he began directing the Doctors and Nurses present to prep Arthur for surgery.

"I recommend you step out of the room, Alekzandar. Things might get messy in here." stated Reeze over his shoulder.

"No, I'm staying with my brother." replied Alekzandar sternly before a wheeze came from Arthur and he immediately was at his side.

"A-Alek...do what he says…" he said in almost a whisper. "I-I'll be fine…"

Alekzandar slowly nod his head and stood up from his kneeling position next to Arthur, a final glance going to Reeze before he left the room and sat down outside in a chair. Once Reeze heard the door close, he snapped his fingers and a Doctor injected a syringe full of anesthesia into Arthur's bloodstream, the man's eyes fluttering a few times before he finally went under.

"Alright people, we have limited time here, so let's get moving!"

Seconds turned into minutes, and minutes turned into hours. The clock ticked by painfully slow and every time Alekzandar looked up at it to see how much had gone by, it always seemed like in six minutes the minute hand only moved one tick. There were sounds one could hear in a metal shop or factory coming out of Arthur's room, and he had no idea what could be going on behind the locked doors.

Finally though, after what seemed like an eternity, he heard the tumblers in the door unlock and he almost leaped out of his chair when the door opened and Reeze stepped out, sweat dripping down his brow and his gloves gone.

"Is he okay?" asked Alekzandar, the scientist glancing at him with a slight frown.

"Yes, but...something unforeseen has happened."

"What?"

Reeze closed the door behind him and sighed heavily, his hands getting shoved into his lab coat's pockets afterwards. "The operation was a success, your brother will live, but...he's no longer fit to be the Emperor."

"No longer able? What the hell does that mean?!" demanded Alekzandar, Reeze kicking an imaginary took with his foot.

"He's somehow gotten a bad case of amnesia, probably from the trauma of his injuries. He doesn't remember anything that's transpired up until now...he doesn't even remember his name."

Alekzandar lost all feeling in his legs and he would've collapsed to his knees if he hadn't caught himself with the arm of the chair next to him, his heart clenching up inside.

"D-Does he remember me at all?"

Reeze shook his head with a regretful look on his face and Alekzandar gripped his chest, the pain too great for him to handle. His brother wouldn't recognize him? Would he even recognize Arthur, who after hours behind locked doors could've changed entirely and become a completely different person.

"So, as his twin brother, in order to not send the Empire as a whole into chaos, you must take on the throne and become the Emperor." said Reeze after pushing himself off the wall he was leaning on and taking his hands out of his pockets. "By that...I mean you must become your brother. I'm sorry to put it harshly, but your brother Arthur is gone. You must fill his spot and relinquish your identity as Alekzandar in order to preserve the Empire."

Alekzandar could only stare at Reeze with mouth agape, the influx of information rendering him unable to think straight. The one thing he did understand though was that Reeze's analysis of the situation was correct. If the Empire's populace discovered that their beloved Emperor had sustained such grievous injuries and had forgotten who he was, there would be an uproar. The only logical solution was for Alekzandar to assume his brother's identity, which would be a little easy considering they were twin brothers.

"And what if someone asks of me…?" he questioned, Reeze turning to put a hand on the door knob.

"Make something up, I don't know. Do everything you can to ensure the people see you as Arthur Pendragon, your Highness." he replied, Alekzandar slowly nodding his head before he stood up and joined the scientist at the door.

"Before we enter, allow me to say something. What I've done to your brother, I've essentially transformed him into something I like to call a "Mechanical-type Teigu." He still possesses a heart and his brain, but everything else had to be replaced by machinery just to keep him alive. I wanted to tell you that now so you wouldn't be shocked by what you see beyond this door."

Alekzandar nodded and Reeze turned the doorknob to lead the way inside, and upon stepping foot into the room his eyes shot wide open and saw that Reeze had been correct once again. Instead of his brother standing next to the bed with a smile on his face, there was instead an outrageously tall figure draped in a long white and blue trench coat, baggy pants, boots and underneath the coat he wore a dress shirt and red tie. He couldn't even see his brother's face due to the helmet covering the entirety of his head.

He turned when he heard them enter and Alekzandar stiffened up, Reeze standing a few feet away with his hands behind his back.

"Ah, hello. Um, could you please inform me of where I am? And...who I am? I can't quite remember." asked Arthur.

" _He really doesn't remember...damn…_ " thought Alekzandar as he cleared his throat.

"You're in a...a laboratory within the Imperial Capital of the Empire. My name -" Alekzandar choked up a little on his own words, but he quickly swallowed his pain and put a fake smile on his face. "My name is Arthur Pendragon, the First Emperor."

Arthur nod his head and he glanced around the room for a few before looking down at his hands, opening and closing them a few times. "And who am I?"

"You're a Mechanical-type Teigu created by Reeze, one of our top scientists, to serve the Empire. Your name is…" started Alekzandar as he thought of what name to give to his brother, which was putting so much stress on his will and heart that it was unbearable hard to keep a smile on his face. "Your given name is King of Kings: Excalibur."

" _Nice…_ " thought Reeze with a slight grin, the newly christened Teigu looking at his hands again and clenching them.

"I see…" he started to say before he returned his gaze to Alekzandar and stood at attention. "Well then, it will be my honor to serve you, your Highness."

 **\- Nightfall -**

The Imperial Capital was silent, its denizens soundly sleeping, with the only noise was the wind softly blowing past the buildings and through the empty streets. Within the Imperial Palace, Alekzandar was walking through the barren hallways towards the throne room, where he was going to try something he hoped would work sometime in the future.

He opened the doors and like he had expected, his brother was standing perfectly still before the throne with his arms hanging at his side. He was in a sort of "sleep mode", meaning he his internal systems were still active, but at a lower rate then if he were awake, and that he was still aware of what was going on around him.

" _It's now or never._ " thought Alekzandar as he approached Arthur and stopped a couple of feet away from him, his height still unnatural to him.

"Auxiliary recording system, activate." he stated clearly, Arthur's eyes flickering a few times in response.

When he felt that it was on and recording, he cleared his throat and stared right at Arthur. "Um, hey, Arthur, it's me...Alekzandar. I...I don't know when you'll hear this, but when you do, I hope you can understand what I'm saying."

For almost an hour, he went through their history, telling Arthur of who he was before he got injured, and when he finally reached the end he sighed and had to keep back the tears that threatened to fall from his eyes.

"What happened to you, getting amnesia and all, it should've been me in your position. I should've been the one to be turned into Excalibur, not you. God, I feel horrible inside about taking the position of Emperor that you earned for yourself...and for impersonating you as well."

Alekzandar sucked up his despair and forced himself to smile as he put his arms behind his back, his gaze remaining planted on Arthur's face.

"But in your place, I swear on my life that I will lead the Empire that you created into a golden age of prosperity and peace, and ensure that all of your hard work was not a waste. I'll be a kind and just ruler, just like you were while your were the King of Avalon. So...when you do eventually regain your memories and find this...know that I will never forget you, my dear brother. This is farewell, Arthur. Goodbye."

 **\- Present Day -**

Excalibur was totally floored at the revelation he had just witnessed. He had watched his entire life flash before his eyes in a matter of seconds, and for the first time in his life he felt like that cavity he had always had in his being, the one thing he could never figure out why he had it, was finally filled.

"I-I know who I am…" he said in almost a whisper, Dreivas staring at his opponent in confusion.

"You what?" he asked.

Excalibur paid no attention to him as he lowered his sword and released his Arondight form, the original white and blue colors coming back to his clothes while he reached up to the back of his head. He pressed both of his index and middle fingers against two buttons built into the back of the helmet, their existence only just now becoming known to him, and pushed down. A hiss escaped from his helmet as the portion with his eyes on it split down the middle and spread apart, sliding back into the helmet and creating a visor-like slit.

Dreivas gasped when Excalibur lifted his head up and stared at him not with mechanical eyes like he had thought were behind the helmet, but with actual human eyes. Excalibur himself was shocked at the fact he still possessed a human aspect of himself, and he couldn't help but reach up and touch the little skin he had left from when he was still Arthur.

" _No...that's not right._ "

"What _are_ you?" questioned Dreivas, Excalibur fixating his cerulean blue eyes on him and furrowing his brow.

"The current me is known as King of Kings: Excalibur, Armor No. 2 of the Six Armors Series…" he started before he pointed his sword skyward and clenched his fist tightly. "But my true name and identity is Arthur Pendragon, Founder and First Emperor of the Empire!"

"No! That's not possible! The First Emperor is dead!" exclaimed Dreivas in defiance of his proclamation, Arthur slowly shaking his head as he aimed his sword at him.

"It is the truth, my mechanical friend. I still contain a heart within my chest, and it was my twin brother, Alekzandar Pendragon, who took my place when I suffered a horrendous injury that led to my transformation into who you know to be Excalibur.""

"No...you're lying!" roared Dreivas as he threw his hand forward and created a wave of tree roots that erupted out of the ground and barreled straight at Arthur.

The former Emperor swept his blade left and right and easily hacked his way through the wall of tree roots, his gaze set on his opponent.

"And as of now, I am bringing an end to this fruitless conflict once and for all. I missed the opportunity presented to me to lead the Empire, and after seeing what has become of my nation after this long, I will fight with all of my strength to rid it of the vile people who have twisted and corrupted it!" announced Arthur with every fiber of his being, his own power beginning to leak out through his body.

A purple stripe appeared along the hemline of his trench coat and continued up to his chest and collar, matching the colors the Emperor would wear and finally complete his transformation from being a mere Teigu to a full power, strength-enhancing machine equipped Emperor who was exceptionally pissed off.

"Emperor or not, I will destroy you!" snarled Dreivas as he tossed his spear away and slapped both of his hands to the ground, a massive amount of vicious killer intent bursting forth from his body. "Mother Nature's Nightmare - Morbuduzahk!"

Arthur stiffened up when the entire cavern tumbled in response to Dreivas, his six sense screaming to him that something extraordinarily bad was about to occur. He waited a few seconds and almost instantly he leaped into the air when the entire floor of the cavern broke apart into dust and chunks of bedrock, Dreivas glaring at him as massive green plant roots emerged from below and began to writhe around like crazy. Arthur watched in horror as several pairs of razor sharp teeth poked out of the ground in a wide circle around Dreivas, the rest of the unknown creature's jaws and head emerging soon after.

They snapped shut around the Mechanical Teigu and the beast swallowed him whole, a deafening screech coming from it soon after that shook the cavern once again.

" **Khehahaha! You think you're so tough?! Just try to kill my Morbuduzahk!** " bellowed Dreivas from within the creature itself, his cocky laugh making Arthur growl at his attitude.

"Sword of Madness - Arondight!" said Arthur, his darker version returning a split second before one of the Morbuduzahk's root-like tendrils shot out at him.

It smashed into the cavern's wall, spraying bits and chunks of bedrock everywhere and showering Arthur in a cloud of dust. Before he could react another tendril slammed into his gut, sending him flying back into the wall and causing Dreivas to laugh again.

" **There's nothing you can do to stop me when I let my pet out! So hurry up and die already!** "

The Morbuduzahk unleashed all of its tentacles on Arthur, the Mechanized Teigu leaping from one part of the wall to the other after recovering from the blow he took in order to dodge them, the cavern quaking so vigorously one would think the entire earth was shaking itself apart. The plant-like Danger Beast grew out a brand new tendril and swung it at Excalibur, a few slashes with his longsword severing it into several pieces that flew by harmlessly. To his shock the tendril almost instantly regenerated and he narrowly avoid it when it lashed out at his head, very nearly beheading him.

" _Damn, this thing is unstoppable!_ " he thought while Dreivas continued to laugh like a maniac, the Morbuduzahk proving to be more then a match for him.

Suddenly a tendril he didn't see slammed him in the back and sent him flying forward right into another, his body hitting the reinforced wood-like flesh of the limb and causing him to grunt when some of the machines in his chest broke. He had no time to recover when the rest of the tendrils began to close in on him, his opponent's intentions becoming perfectly clear. Dreivas was going to crush him, and if he didn't act fast this fight was going to be over.

" _You must survive!_ " he heard his brother's voice resonate within his mind once again, the tendrils drawing closer and closer.

" _My brother...just like you had done for me, I will not fail you. I will return the Empire that you cared for in my absence back to its former glory! I swear it!_ "

He pushed himself off the tendril and to Dreivas' shock, he began to levitate in the air with both hands on the hilt of his longsword and his eyes closed. Now was the time to showcase his true power.

"Bestow unto me thy divine and righteous power...the power to destroy the darkness and make way for the light!" he proclaimed at the top of his lungs, the tendrils of the Morbuduzahk fully encompassing him. "Holy Seal Unleashed - Caliburnus!"

The entire cavern suddenly lit up with a flash of bright yellow light, the tendrils around Arthur immediately withdrawing and a screech sounding off from the Morbuduzahk at the intensity of the light. Dreivas stared in awe as Arthur was consumed by a huge column of the glowing energy, his figure a mere shadow within it, and he couldn't help but feel as if he was being visited by a deity from heaven itself.

Within the light Excalibur's appearance began to morph once again, the color of his clothes and body changing from its Arondight mode to a brightly shining gold, his own eyes gaining a red color from the original cerulean blue, and from his back sprouted two large and grand angel wings that were pure white, giving him the appearance of an angelic warrior. His longsword also began to change as well, most of its structure disintegrating into particles of white light that faded away while the blade changed into the shape of a more traditional longsword with a gold and blue hilt, an extended handle grip and a blade easily just as long as his original weapon.

He opened his eyes and the column of light dissipated, Dreivas gasping at his new appearance. He brought his sword up with his dominant hand and aimed it towards the heavens, his power beginning to leak out of his body and create such a powerful whirlwind that it flattened the Morbuduzahk against the cavern floor and negated its ability to move whatsoever. Dreivas was beginning to panic now, the raw strength of the sword Arthur was wielding sending nervous chills running all throughout his body and very nearly paralyzing him.

"Taste my divine wrath, you foul creature!" shouted Arthur before the bedrock beneath the Morbuduzahk exploded, an even larger pillar of light energy consuming it and launching it towards the cavern roof.

Its massive body broke through and continued to be pushed upward, Arthur flying up underneath while letting loose a battle cry and piercing his holy sword through its bottom in order to accelerate it faster and faster through the earth towards the surface.

Several thousand feet above them, on the landmass Dreivas had separated from the earth with some of his massive tree roots before delving below to fight, the Inquisitor had just been blown back again by a devastating kick from Tatsumi that knocked the wind out of him. His opponents had proven to be a tough bunch to take down, just like Kurome had, and he had only managed to incapacitate Lubbock, Leone, Chelsea and Run before Tatsumi, Esdeath, Maya and Mine took over in fighting him, leaving Wave and Akame to protect their fallen comrades while Najenda began to heal them with Solomon's Phoenix blood. Thankfully Esdeath had already dispatched of the Faceless their attackers had brought with them, meaning they were safe from a sneak attack by the silent warriors.

"I now see for myself why you were known as the Empire's Strongest General…" murmured the Inquisitor as he removed an icicle stabbed through his right shoulder, Tatsumi and Esdeath glaring at him from a few meters away while Mine watched from afar, her finger hovering over Pumpkin's trigger.

" _Just give me another opening guys, that's all I need._ " she thought before looking back down her rifle's scope.

"You're a pretty strong opponent as well, possibly even stronger then Budo." replied Esdeath with a grin as she wiped a tiny drip of blood from the corner of her mouth, the Inquisitor tipping his hat to her courteously while he popped his arm back into place.

"That means alot, coming from someone such as you. Thank you."

"You're going to pay for what you did to Kurome. This is the end of the line for you." growled Tatsumi as he twirled Neuntote in his hand and glared at the Inquisitor.

They were about to go at one another again before they felt the raised platform of earth rumble, causing all of them to freeze and try to figure out what could've caused it to shake. It happened again and Tatsumi glanced at Esdeath, who simply shrugged her shoulders in confusion, before suddenly a gigantic beam of light shot up out of the ground next to the earth platform. It rose up miles high into the sky and they watched closely, seeing something large and green in color at its peak.

Maya squinted her eyes to try and see what could possibly be within the pillar of light and she gasped when she recognized the person within it.

"It's Excalibur!" she exclaimed, Esdeath and Tatsumi looking up and watching with her as Arthur continued to rise higher and higher with Dreivas and the Morbuduzahk.

Finally after several hundred more meters he pushed through and skewered the Danger Beast, flying through its flesh and reaching Dreivas within the empty pocket inside the beast's head. He had no time to protect himself and he yelled out when Arthur burst through and pierced the Teigu's chest, running half of Caliburnus through him and splitting his core in two before they both flew out through the Morbuduzahk's teeth, Arthur snapping his fingers as soon as he left his feet leave its flesh.

Almost instantly the light disintegrated the Danger Beast and reduced it to ash while he twirled once in the air and began to fly back towards the ground like a screaming bullet, his eyes set upon the lifted earth battlefield his friends were on.

Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya quickly vacated the area while the Inquisitor stood his ground and watched as Dreivas and Arthur barreled towards them at breakneck speed.

In a matter of seconds they smashed into the ground in an explosion of light, dust and chunks of dirt and grass that were flung in every direction. Esdeath held an arm up and squinted her eyes to prevent herself from being blinded, her long hair whipping in the wind behind her. When the dust finally settled and the light faded away, they all saw Arthur standing over top Dreivas with Caliburnus stabbed through him and into the ground, a few sparks flying out from the wound. He breathed one last time before Arthur twisted his sword sharply to the right, severing the core from the rest of his body by cutting the wires and tubes it was connected to.

Dreivas' eyes flickered out of existence and he truly died, Arthur sighing heavily as he payed his silent respects to his old friend before he deactivated his Trump Card and returned to normal, Caliburnus morphing back into his regular longsword as he removed it from Dreivas and stood up.

"Excalibur? Are you okay?" asked Tatsumi, Arthur chuckling as he rolled his shoulders.

"Yes, I'm fine. But please, don't call me Excalibur any more." he said, his question confusing everyone present before he glanced back over his shoulder and revealed to them the human skin he still possessed. "My name is Arthur, Arthur Pendragon."

"Arthur? Where did you get that from?" questioned Maya with the raising of an eyebrow before she noticed the small part of his human face. "Wait, are you actually human?!"

Arthur shook his head, "Formerly. Before Excalibur, my name was Arthur Pendragon, former King of Avalon as well as founder and _true_ First Emperor of the Empire. The First Emperor you all know from history was in fact my twin brother, Alekzandar Pendragon."

Starting with Maya and going from one person to the other, their mouths dropped to the floor in utter shock and awe. Even the Inquisitor was surprised by the sudden revealing of Arthur's true identity. The being known as Excalibur was supposedly the man known as the First Emperor, the founder of the Empire and mastermind behind the original forty eight Teigu.

"That's...hard to believe." stated Esdeath, Arthur slowly nodding his head in understanding before he hoisted his sword over his shoulder.

"I can see why you would believe it's not true. However, this is what will allow me to prove to you all that I am indeed the First Emperor." replied Arthur before he closed his eyes and cleared his throat. "Auxiliary recording system, playback tape number one."

A click resonated out from within his body, the voice recognition device turning on the device and after a few seconds, it began to crackle at a loud enough volume so that everyone could hear.

"Um, hey, Arthur, it's me...Alekzandar. I...I don't know when you'll hear this, but when you do, I hope you can understand what I'm saying." said a voice that sounded almost exactly like Arthur, but they could tell just by the tone and how he was speaking that it was indeed not their friend.

Arthur fast forwarded through the tape until he arrived at the end of the recording and waited silently with his eyes closed, the sound of his brother's voice bringing back all sorts of memories and feelings.

"What happened to you, getting amnesia and all, it should've been me in your position. I should've been the one to be turned into Excalibur, not you. God, I feel horrible inside about taking the position of Emperor that you earned for yourself...and for impersonating you as well. But in your place, I swear on my life that I will lead the Empire that you created into a golden age of prosperity and peace, and ensure that all of your hard work was not a waste. I'll be a kind and just ruler, just like you were while your were the King of Avalon. So...when you do eventually regain your memories and find this...know that I will never forget you, my dear brother. This is farewell, Arthur. Goodbye."

Arthur turned off the recording device and opened his eyes again, seeing Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya close their mouths and finally realize that he had indeed spoke the truth, and that they were in the presence of the First Emperor himself. Tatsumi couldn't stop himself from bowing slightly towards him and grinning behind his helmet, Arthur returning the gesture before he glanced at Esdeath and nodded once.

"All of you were able to see the corruption that has befallen my nation and decided to rise up against it in order to eliminate the vile people who have plagued its very heart and soul. You all have sacrificed so much, and for that I am eternally grateful." he stated before he returned his gaze to the Inquisitor and stared hard at him. "So now, as First Emperor, I will repay the favor. I can tell this man is exceptionally strong, and thanks to my body and its self-regeneration abilities, I am the best suited combatant to fight him."

"Are you sure you want to fight him?" asked Maya, Arthur looking back at her and winking.

"You all have been the best of friends anyone could ask for. I'm glad that I was able to be alongside you. But do not worry, I have no intention of dying. I will survive and see this revolution to the end and watch this corrupted regime fall and be returned back to what is should be." said Arthur, the Inquisitor chuckling to himself as he lifted Brahmastra somewhat and reached up to the monocle her wore.

One piece at a time he shed the monocle, shrugged off his over coat and slipped off the bow tie he wore, allowing him to unbutton the top button of his dress shirt and free up some room for his neck.

"This fight has indeed become interesting. To think I would have the honor to fight the First Emperor…" he said as Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya quickly retreated back to their friends, whom had gone to the other end of the massive hunk of earth. "But just like you, I have no intention of dying here. I shall continue to be by my Mistress' side in order to protect and serve her."

"You seem devoted to that Great General...why is that?" asked Arthur.

The Inquisitor relaxed his stance somewhat now that he knew that Arthur wasn't intent on attacking right now, and he smiled. "We've known each other ever since we were kids. We were both orphans in the Empire and I protected her from kids that would always pick on her because of her unique eye color. On that day I promised to her that I would always stay by her side and protect her, no matter what...even if that means killing people by her orders. I know that I'll eventually pay for my actions, but until that day comes, I will continue to keep my promise to her...I care about her as my closest friend."

"I see…" started Arthur with a slow nod. "You are indeed noble in your devotion. I admire that. You are most definitely one of the first people from the Empire that I have seen who is not corrupted or evil. It would've been an honor to fight by you side instead of against you."

"I appreciate that. Now...let us begin, shall we? There's no use in delaying the inevitable, right?" asked the Inquisitor, Excalibur bringing out his sword and pointing the tip at him.

"Indeed. Let's bring this to an end, once and for all."


	32. I Shall Not Fall

A/N Oh shit son, it's about to go down. The TRUE First Emperor has made his appearance (I bet you all weren't expecting that turn of events) and has sworn to take down the Empire of now and return it back to the way it should be just like when he founded it a thousand years prior. And his opponent is none other then the Inquisitor, Jacqueline's personal protector and strongest subordinate. Both men are fierce followers of their ideals and their will is as mighty and strong as tempered steel, with neither planning on going down. But, my friends, we all know the rule of Teigu and their users, correct? Let the all-out brawl begin.

Also, HEAR HEAR, EVERYONE SHUT THE FUCK UP AND LISTEN FOR ONE DAMN SECOND. THAT MEANS YOU FRANK! Ahem, anyways, I am going to be doing two things here. One, and I am gonna trust you guys with this, **IF YOU WANT TO** , you may help me edit the pages I have under this story on **FanficCollective** , which means character information and such. It would be a huge help to me since I'm about to head to college and won't be having a lot of free-time in order to add on to the wiki.

The second thing is that I created a poll for you guys to do, so if you'll take some time out of your days to check it out and provide an answer for me, that would be great. I am just curious is all, since WE ALL KNOW it's gonna happen. *Spolier Alert*. It will be on my profile at the top, where there's a link for it. Other then that, Leave a fav and review my friends.

* * *

 **Chapter 31 - I Shall Not Fall**

Arthur and the Inquisitor stared each other down, their feet rooted to the spot with their weapons at the ready. During his fight with Esdeath, Tatsumi and Maya he had already upgraded Brahmastra to its second, more powerful form, and thanks to his transformation after discovering his real identity, he could feel his power flowing through him at an unprecedented level.

Both fighters were ready to unleash their true strengths. And from afar, Tatsumi and Esdeath were observing from the cover of the forest atop the chunk of earth Dreivas had lifted up earlier. Tatsumi still had Tyrannus active, just in case he needed to step into the fight if Arthur got into any trouble, but he highly doubted it. Arthur had been right to say he was the one person that could fight the Inquisitor on equal footing thanks to the regeneration factor his status as a Mechanical-type Teigu granted him...he just hoped that the Inquisitor didn't find his core.

"He'll be fine, Tatsumi. We're here in case he needs our help." said Esdeath with a smile, Tatsumi looking over at her with a laugh.

"To be honest I thought I would be saying that to you. You're the one that loves to fight and by now you would be itching to jump right in again." he replied.

"That's true...but now that I know its the First Emperor out there, I feel like it just needs to be him. He's been in the dark for so long, and after regaining his memories and seeing the Empire he created in such a sorry state...he's bound to be beyond pissed off. Interrupting him would be an insult...he needs to do this himself." explained Esdeath without taking her eyes of Arthur, Tatsumi reaching over and putting an arm around her while laughing a little.

"Wow, you're right. You really _have_ changed from when I first met you." he joked, causing her to roll her eyes.

"Don't remind me."

At that exact moment Arthur and the Inquisitor became a blur, the two combatants beginning their brawl by sprinting at one another. The former definitely had the height advantage and with his longsword could easily reach the Inquisitor with its eight and a half foot long blade, but the Inquisitor still held an advantage over him with his Marginal Counter. He dodged a swipe from Arthur and brought up his rifle to put a scorching hole through his chest, but instead of reeling from the blow he spun around and threw a kick at the Inquisitor's head.

He leaped back a few feet to avoid the slash, giving Arthur time to regenerate and fill the hole and prepare his next strategy just as the Inquisitor did the same.

" _I can't go soft on this man, I need to enter Arondight now! And that Teigu of his...I recognize it. I know what I need to do._ "

" _He's obviously powerful and he can heal himself like Dreivas. I need to locate his core as quickly as possible._ "

"Sword of Madness - Arondight!"

The Inquisitor was caught off guard when Arthur switched forms and rushed him again, only this time he could see something was a little off with his opponent. Unlike before when he was fighting Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya, and even before that with Kurome, they were all moving pretty much at half-speed to him, but now with Arthur entering this heightened state...he was moving faster. _Much_ faster. Which meant only one thing...in this form, Arthur was moving so fast that to the Inquisitor and his Marginal Counter, he wasn't moving in slow motion.

He grunted after catching a fist from Arthur and he quickly ducked underneath a decapitating neck slice, Brahmastra coming up once again to fire off several more plasma bolts through Arthur's body that only seemed to faze him for a fraction of second before he recovered and pressed his attack.

"Enough!" bellowed the Inquisitor as he sidestepped Arthur and smashed his elbow into the side of the Teigu's head, caving in a portion of his helmet and throwing him to the side and very nearly off the edge of the earth chunk.

Thankfully he stabbed his sword into the dirt and came to a halt a few inches away from falling off, his helmet repairing itself as he returned to his full height and growled when the Inquisitor raised Brahmastra up and lifted his finger off the trigger. The rifle unleashed a devastating beam that could easily consume Arthur, but in a split second he reared his arm back and prepared to lunge right into the plasma with no fear.

"Sword of Strength - Laevatein!" he bellowed, his clothes and appearance morphing from their dark and ominous colors to a fiery red, yellow and orange as he threw his blade forward.

The Inquisitor was shocked when when plasma beam struck the forward edge of Arthur's longsword and actually _split_ apart, the bolt shooting off harmlessly around him and leaving Arthur completely unscathed.

" _Arondight may be my strongest form all around, but nothing can top the sheer strength of Laevatein's penetrating power!_ " thought Arthur with a laugh before he leaped into the air and swung down into the Inquisitor, the man rolling to the side to avoid the strengthened blade.

He thanked god he hadn't stayed underneath the downward swing when the blade struck the earth and cut at least five feet deep into it while creating a huge impact crater around the sword and Arthur, telling him its power was overwhelmingly strong. He didn't have to plan another strategy when the mechanized First Emperor pull his sword from the stone and lunged at him again, forcing the Inquisitor into a corner as he pummeled him with devastating blows that would pulverise a normal human being.

The Inquisitor, however, wasn't a normal human being. After dodging a punch from Arthur he returned one of his own that smashed through his chest, followed by grabbing onto his head and bringing him down so he could ram his knee into his jaw and wrench his neck far back past the normal angle. To finish off the devastating counter-attack, the Inquisitor pressed the barrel of Brahmastra up against Arthur's right shoulder and fired, the large plasma beam completely vaporizing it and severing his left arm from his body.

"You think that can stop me! I've fought Tyrant himself as a normal human! This is child's play!" roared Arthur as he stabbed his sword into the ground and spun himself around, catching the Inquisitor in the jaw with the heel of his foot and breaking his neck from the force of the blow.

The Inquisitor stumbled back and grabbed at his head, quickly snapping it back in place just in time to dodge Arthur and leap back in order to use Brahmastra more effectively. He fired a series of quick bursts from the rifle, spraying the earth in an attempt to hit Arthur, but thanks to his speed he was able to avoid them all and get closer and closer to attack him.

As he prepared himself to go toe-to-toe with the Teigu once again, his mind was racing with battle strategies and counter-moves he had developed over the years to deal with all sorts of enemies and targets. At the same time...memories of his past life were present as well, and he was subconsciously going through them like a storybook.

 **\- Imperial Capital Orphanage -**

 **\- Eighteen Years Ago -**

"You're gonna come back, right?" asked Jacqueline on the verge of tears as she grasped his shirt tightly, her only friend laughing at her and nodding his head.

"Of course I will, I promised to always be by your side, didn't I?" he said, Jacqueline's smile coming back as he ran his hand through her auburn hair to reassure her of his return.

He was eighteen now, and eighteen was the maximum age someone staying at the orphanage can be before they're made to leave and make a life for themselves, which was exactly what he was doing right now. Jacqueline of course was terrified at the idea that her only friend was leaving and she was fighting tooth and nail to keep him from doing so, but in the end he was able to convince her that he would be back regardless of what.

And not even a day passed before he stayed true to his word and returned to the orphanage as an employee, and just like before he continued to care and watch over her, protecting her from those who thought ill of her and eating with her at lunch when no one else did.

When she turned seven years old, she was asked by one of the employees to go to one of the rooms used to introduce a child to their possible parents, one she had been in previously many times before. The door was opened for her and she was surprised to see her friend in the chair opposite of the one she would normally sit in, and when he heard her enter he looked at her and smiled.

"Why are you in here?" she asked as she sat down in her chair.

"What do you think?" he asked as he took out a manilla folder and rested it on the table between them, her eyes catching the big red "APPROVED" stamped onto the folder.

She looked back up at him and he could see tears starting to develope in the corners of her eyes when she began to put the pieces of the puzzle together and realize what was happening. "Y-You…"

"Yes, Jacqueline...I'm going to adopt you. I'll be your legal guardian." he said, Jacqueline's lower lip quivering as joy and overtook her heart.

She climbed off the chair, sprinted around the table and threw herself into his arms, crying into his shoulder in pure happiness, the young Inquisitor smiling as he pat her softly on the back and embraced her. He let her cry for as long as she wanted and said nothing, since this was the one thing that she had been hoping for ever since she had arrived at the orphanage at age four. It had taken three long years of untold abuse from the other kids and long days of loneliness, but finally her waiting had payed off and she would be able to leave the orphanage with someone who well and truly cared about her and didn't care about little things like what color her eyes were.

"T-Thank you...s-so much…" she said through the tears, the young Inquisitor only nodding his head.

When she had finally stopped crying they left the place that had been their home for a majority of their lives and took her to a house he had bought for himself with money that she had no idea he had. Upon walking through the door into the decently sized building she was amazed at how he could've been able to get the money for it from just working at the orphanage.

"How could you pay for this?" she asked with a glance back at the young Inquisitor, he rubbed the back of his neck and smiled sheepishly.

"About that...um...I have another job."

"Another? What is it?"

He motioned for her to follow him and he took her to the small study the house offered, her eyes growing wide in wonder when she saw a strange-looking rifle resting on a desk in the center of the room with a case next to it.

"To make up for the funds, I took on a job as "hired help" so to speak."

"Are you an assassin?" asked Jacqueline innocently, the young Inquisitor's smile dropping as he slowly nod his head.

However, instead of getting the appalled reaction like he was expecting, Jacqueline's eyes brightened up and she whirled back around to look at the rifle. "That's so _cool_! Is this what you use? What is it? Is it a Teigu?"

He chuckled at her curiosity and strided over to the desk in order to kneel down beside her and pick up the rifle to show it to her.

"Indeed. It's name is Divine Heaven Piercer: Brahmastra, and it can fire pure bolts of plasma. I found it while I was out travelling on one of my missions and I've been using it since then."

Her questions started off a session of him telling her a multitude of stories about him travelling all across the Empire, seeing strange and new places, and throughout the entire time Jacqueline was totally absorbed in every single word he said. At the end of his final story she yawned and he could see her eyes start to glaze over, so he picked her up and carried her into an extra room he had turned into a bedroom in anticipation for her arrival and set her down gently on the bed. He pulled the covers up to her chin and she turned over, instantly falling asleep within their comforting embrace.

The young Inquisitor couldn't help but smile at the day's events and he slowly backed up towards the door, being sure to make as little noise as possible, and grasped the doorknob. He waited a few more seconds in case she would suddenly wake up and ask something of him, but when all that he heard were her soft breaths escaping her lips and fully closed the door.

He made the trek to his own room that was just down the hall and slipped comfortably into the covers, his eyes fluttering a few times before he let the lure of sleep take him off into the land of sweet, sweet slumber.

An unknown amount of time passed before a bloodcurdling scream woke him with a start from the dead of sleep and he sprinted out of his room, going down the hall and flinging open the door to Jacqueline's room in order to run inside and see what was wrong. He found her sitting up in her bed with tears streaming down her face and her knees pulled up close to her chest, his instincts instantly taking him to her side so he could hug and comfort her.

"It's fine, it's fine, you're safe." he cooed to try and calm her down, but she kept crying and crying so instead of pressing any further he waited until she calmed herself down. "Are you okay? What happened?"

"I-I...I had a n-nightmare...it was o-of...my p-parents…" she sobbed, his eyes shooting wide open.

Her parents? He hadn't heard her say one thing about her parents, and if she just had a nightmare about them it could only mean that something traumatizing must've happened in order for something like this to happen.

"What happened in it?" he asked, Jacqueline removing her face from his shoulder so he could wipe the tears from her eyes.

It took a few since she was still in shock from the nightmare and she kept stuttering and sniffing, but when she finally finished telling him what had happened, he felt an unbearable amount of sadness and pity in his heart for this young girl who had suffered such a horrible tragedy at a young age.

"Jacqueline, I swear on my life that I will never leave your side. I'll take care of you, protect you, and help you accomplish this goal through whatever means necessary. I swear on it."

Without saying another word he wrapped his arms around her again and hugged her, Jacqueline doing the same around his neck and burying her face into his shoulder. After a few minutes of silence she finally returned to a relaxed state and got back under the bed covers, the young Inquisitor fixing to leave until she grabbed onto his shirt and gave him and pleading stare.

"Can you stay here, please?" she asked, a smile appearing on his face as he nod his head and closed the door he had opened. He pulled up a chair next to her bed and leaned back in it as he placed a hand on top of her head, Jacqueline closing her eyes and shifting a little to find her comfort spot.

"Anything for you, my Little Mistress."

 **\- Southern Lands of the Empire -**

 **\- Twelve Years Later -**

"So why exactly are we out here again?" asked the Inquisitor, age thirty, the now nineteen year old Jacqueline glancing up at him since he was taller then her and grinned.

"Hunting Danger Beasts. General Esdeath does it in her past time, so I thought I would do the same. Could be fun, y'know?" she said happily, the Inquisitor rolling his eyes and simply chuckling at her enthusiasm.

"Very well, Jacqueline. But do take care and not go too far, okay?" he asked, Jacqueline nodding as she slowed her pace down a little so that he can remain within stride of her and could protect her if it came to it. He had Brahmastra within its carrying case over his shoulder and was ready to use it at a moment's notice, his eyes scanning the surrounding landscape for any signs of hostile Danger Beasts.

A few days prior she had received her very own Teigu, Devil's Heart, as a gift for being promoted to the position of General, so he wasn't as worried as before when she was on a battlefield.

They began their search, looking around for any signs of prey that they could hunt, but it seemed like there were no signs of Danger Beasts at all. They were sorely mistaken. It all happened so fast, with the sudden ambush, the firing of Brahmastra, and the blood. Jacqueline immediately got injured and since she didn't have complete mastery over her Teigu, she couldn't heal quickly enough to effectively defend herself from the attacking Danger Beasts, which left the Inquisitor alone against the thirty or so reptilian creatures. Even with Brahmastra and his skills as an assassin at his side, all he could do against the savage beasts was defend and hold them back for as long as possible until they were found by other soldiers that drove off the Danger Beasts.

"Jacqueline…are you okay?" asked the Inquisitor as he slowly turned around, a weak smile on his face.

She was instantly at his side after her wounds had been healed to catch him, his own body giving out on him at the very last second. The Danger Beasts had done a number on his body, with huge lacerations present in both his abdomen, back and thighs, his entire right arm had been bitten off from the elbow down, and there was so much blood coming out of his wounds that he didn't have long to live.

"Somebody help me! We've got to get him back to the capital! _Please_!"

He was rushed back to the Imperial Capital as fast as possible and he was admitted to the hospital, but even then his time was fast approaching. Jacqueline was on the verge of tears at losing her only friend, and it seemed like all hope was lost due to the state he was in until the door to his room opened and she whirled around, a man in bifocals dressed in a long lab coat striding in.

"Who are you?"

"The man who's going to save his life. The name's Doctor Anton Von Kupchyenko, or Anton for short. Now if you'll please kindly step back, we need to operate now." said the man quickly as several other men carrying various tools and mechanical devices on carts following him inside.

"All I ask is this. Do you trust me?" asked Anton, Jacqueline blinking a few times and glancing at the Inquisitor before nodding. "Good. Let us begin!"

"Before that, do you think I can help as well?" she asked.

"What do you mean by that?"

"My bones...they're incredibly dense and hard to break because of my Teigu. Maybe we can replace his bones with an entirely new set made of mine." stated Jacqueline as she placed a hand gingerly on the skin just above where Devil's Heart rested, Anton looking at her with a raised eyebrow before he nodded.

"Yes...I believe I can do that. But we would have to relocate to my laboratory so that I could have more room to work."

Without another word Jacqueline, the doctor and his lab assistants moved the comatose Inquisitor to his laboratory, which was thankfully close by, and as soon as they set him up with life support equipment Jacqueline was surprised when the doctor's lower-half liquefied into a black tar-like substance that grew out various tentacles that spread out throughout the room to gather the necessary equipment he needed.

He noticed her staring and he pointed to the Inquisitor, saying, "Time is of the essence, General. I'm going to work fast, so I need you to create your bones as fast as possible while I fashion them into new bones for him."

Jacqueline nod her head and they began their work with Anton creating a tendril that cut a clean slit through the Inquisitor's skin from the base of his neck down to his abdomen after he had been put under. Five painstakingly long hours later, the doctor withdrew from the Inquisitor and tore off his bloodied gloves, the operation now complete. Jacqueline took a few steps forward and looked over her friend and guardian, her expression morphing to shock when she saw that even though she had witnessed many of his damaged or not functioning internal organs get replaced by the machines the doctor's assistants had brought in, along with his entire bone structure getting replaced by one made of her own bones, there were no scars left behind whatsoever. The only markers that stood out were the strange hexagonal skin patterns that now stretched across his shoulders, but she didn't care about those at all.

What she cared about most was that after a few seconds the Inquisitor coughed and his eyes fluttered open, a smile of pure joy spreading across her face at his full recovery. Before he could say anything she literally threw herself at him and hugged him, his eyes shooting wide open for a fraction of a second before he took in his surroundings and the doctor winking at him from a few feet away that he had recovered from his previous injuries.

"I thought you were gonna die…" stuttered Jacqueline, the Inquisitor patting her on the back and returning her hug.

"Like I've said...I'm not ever going to leave your side. I swore on it, and I will continue to keep that promise until my body is nothing but ash."

 **\- Present Day -**

" _That's right…_ " thought the Inquisitor with a smile before he was drawn out of his thoughts by Arthur letting out a battlecry.

He couldn't react quick enough and before his very eyes the Teigu swept his sword up and cut clean through his right arm, severing the limb in two from the bicep down. He grunted at the loss of his arm and stumbled backward, Arthur watching and waiting for him to collapse onto his knees in defeat due to this injury coupled with the other cuts and lacerations he had inflicted onto the Inquisitor's strengthened body.

However, he remained standing and brought his head up to stare at Arthur whilst breathing heavily as if to say he wasn't going to give up just yet. "You are undoubtedly the strongest fighter I have ever met...your determination is astounding."

"I...have to remain at her side...I must. I swore on it." said the Inquisitor as he brought up his other arm with Brahmastra still in his grasp and pointed the barrel at Arthur, his body screaming at every single movement he made. "I've watched her grow up from when she was only five years old...and I want to continue to do so until my body turns to ash."

"I see…" started Arthur before he gripped his longsword in the same fashion from his fight with Dreivas before activating his Trump Card. "But this is the end of the line."

Suddenly he launched himself up into the air and began to levitate, his eyes closing shut and a bright light beginning to emanate from his hands.

"Bestow unto me thy divine and righteous power...the power to destroy the darkness and make way for the light! Holy Seal Unleashed - Caliburnus!" he bellowed, the Inquisitor shielding his eyes when an enormous pillar of light erupted from within him and stretched miles high into the sky.

He gained his angel wings and his longsword transformed into Caliburnus, the holy sword radiating such power that the Inquisitor couldn't stop himself from feeling like he was at the gateway to heaven. Upon seeing this majestic transformation he couldn't help but smile as he retrieved Brahmastra's carrying case and proceeded to attach on the final components he needed in order to use the rifle at its full potential.

He finished upgrading it and he turned to face Arthur, who by now had finished transforming and was levitating within the pillar of light with his hand gripping Caliburnus tightly.

"If this is to be my final act on this world, then I will accept my death with open arms! Come! Show me your Trump Card, and I will meet it head on! Let us see whose ideals are stronger!" proclaimed the Inquisitor at the top of his lungs, the energy within Brahmastra beginning to build up the longer he kept his finger on the trigger.

"Very well, I accept your challenge! Show me your tenacity!" replied back Arthur as he drew back Caliburnus and prepared to dive down at the Inquisitor, his opposite closing one eye and aiming down his rifle's scope in order to aim properly due to his blurry sight as a result of utilizing Marginal Counter for so long.

"Divine Judgement - Brahmashirsha Astra!" shouted the Inquisitor before lifting his finger off the trigger and unleashing a monumentally sized beam of plasma that dwarfed the previous one from the last time he used his Trump Card in size and power.

Arthur clenched his fingers around the hilt of Caliburnus and shot forward at breakneck speed, the tip of of his energy cloaked shoulder striking the leading edge of the plasma beam and splitting it apart like a flower, with smaller individual beams flying off around him into the sky. The Inquisitor growled and increased the power of the beam by tapping the trigger again, causing Arthur to grunt when the surge of plasma struck him as he pushed his way through.

His wings folded up as tight as they could and he let out a battle cry, the golden light energy surrounding him increasing in volume. The plasma however began to erode away the shield and Arthur could see his shoulder begin to disintegrate little by little, and he still had more then halfway to go before reaching the Inquisitor.

He flapped his wings and created such a devastating windstorm that it knocked back the Inquisitor a few feet and interrupted his concentration for a fraction of a second, Arthur taking advantage of the the temporary lapse and pushing on through the plasma beam without much resistance.

"Nice try, but it's not...enough!" growled the Inquisitor after recovering, his finger tapping the trigger three times and sending three massive pulses of plasma up the stream at Arthur.

When each burst hit him it eroded more and more of his shield away, causing bits and pieces of his body to scrape away and turn to ash in an instant at a steady rate.

"No...I cannot…!" grunted Arthur as he pushed back against the overwhelming force of the plasma and, uncaring of what would happen to his body, he poured all of his remaining power into propelling himself forward, with the Inquisitor matching him by increasing the Trump Card's intensity again and again.

"I shall not fall!" they both roared as loud as they could possibly yell, their techniques causing a bright flash of light to come forth from their meeting point.

Tatsumi and Esdeath had to pull away and cover their eyes with their arms so they weren't blinded by the extreme light. Within the excruciatingly bright light, Arthur landed on the ground with both feet and swept Caliburnus upward at an angle, the holy blade slicing clean through Brahmastra and cutting through the Inquisitor starting near his left hip, up and cross his chest, and then finally leaving his body through his left shoulder.

The sword had severed the last remaining arteries that his body required to keep his heart pumping and brain functioning, and when all of that blood would run out his heart would cease to function, even with the machines implanted into his body.

The light finally faded and Tatsumi and Esdeath saw what had become of the two opponents, and they couldn't stop themselves from feeling overjoyed. Arthur was standing a few feet in front of the Inquisitor with an arm held upward, Caliburnus in its grasp, and was breathing heavily as a result of losing a large portion of his body that included his entire left arm. Before him the Inquisitor was standing perfectly still with the now inoperable Brahmastra in his only remaining hand, but after a few seconds he coughed and dropped to his knees when blood from the massive laceration spanning his body from his hip to his shoulder began to seep out and stain his shirt.

As he fell onto his back and let go of Brahmastra, Arthur looked down on his adversary and nod his head out of respect. "You were a worthy opponent, my friend. May you find peace in the next life."

With that, Arthur walked away from the fallen Inquisitor towards Tatsumi and Esdeath, who had made themselves known by walking out from the tree line. While they returned back to where their friends were waiting for them, the Inquisitor had already started to feel death coming ever closer, his body becoming weaker and weaker with each passing second.

" _I always knew that karma would one day catch up with me...but even so…_ "

Slowly he pushed himself up and coughed vigorously as he got into his knees, his lungs straining themselves just to keep on circulating air.

"No...I mustn't die here...I need to return...to her!" he said through labored breaths as he got back onto his feet and hobbled forward, every single muscle in his body feeling as if it were on fire.

One step at a time he moved forward, his vision becoming blurry the more he exerted himself. It was no longer his own strength that was keeping him up, but his sheer will power and drive to return to the one person he cared most about in this world. He couldn't leave her, he had promised her that he would always come back and be by her side, through thick and thin, and every time he always made sure to keep it.

" _You're gonna come back, right?_ "

" _Of course I will, I promised to always be by your side, didn't I?_ "

"I need to survive...for her sake…!" he said after another excruciating footfall, his arm swaying at his side.

He only got so far until he fell back onto the ground, grunting and spitting up more blood on impact. It got harder to breath and to relieve some stress on his lungs he rolled back over onto his backside, his lungs clearing up somewhat and enabling him to breath a little easier with the exception of the blood still seeping out of his wound. He tried once again to get up after he rested for a few moments but soon found his legs wouldn't respond to his brain's commands, which meant he could no longer move.

"L-Looks like I...I won't be able to keep my promise…" he murmured, his breaths growing farther and farther apart due to his heart slowing in pace. "J-Jacqueline...I'm s-so sorry...I failed you…"

Tears began to emerge from the corners of his eyes and they streamed down the side of his head and into the grass, his mind once again replaying all of the moments and time he had spent with Jacqueline from when he first met her to recent years. He smiled when he remembered those days he spent eating and talking with her, that joyful smile she constantly had on her face a ray of sunshine he always had the pleasure to see. He remembered the day he adopted her, and how happy she had been, and how from then on he was able to watch her grow and mature into who she was today. Not all of it was good, like when she had those nightmares about her parents and such, but overall he enjoyed every last _second_ of it...and he would give up everything and the world in order to relive it all again just _one_ last time.

" _I w-wanted to...be by your side until the end...to p-protect you, t-to care for you…_ " he thought as unrelenting sadness gripped his heart, his final moments now upon him.

He looked to his left and his eyes widened when, standing right next to him, was a ghost-like apparition of Jacqueline when she was seven years old. She was smiling at him and without saying a word she lowered herself down onto the grass and curled up next him, her tiny little hands wrapping around his like a child would do to its father. Her chin nuzzled up against the side of his neck and she let out a long sigh...a sigh made by a person who's had a long day and they needed a good, long rest.

"Goodnight...Roman…" she whispered as she closed her eyes, the Inquisitor's eyes slowly beginning to close as well when he began to slip away.

He had always heard that when one was about to die, they could feel the freezing cold grip of death come upon them as they passed on to the next life. However, instead of feeling cold...he surprisingly felt warm, like the gentle touch of the sun in summer, and with a final breath he accepted his fate and closed his eyes to go to sleep with the young Jacqueline beside him...just like he always would from years that have long since passed.

"G-Goodnight...my Little...Mistress…"

A/N I listened to the OST that plays when Bols dies while writing that last part. My heart is in pieces. I'm gonna go into that corner again from earlier when I killed off Kurome...goodbye for now...


	33. My Beloved Inquisitor

A/N Okay, I'm out of the corner...for now. Inquisitor, I salute you. You were an awesome, honorable and moral character who was just fighting for the wrong side. So, here, I humbly put you to rest and that I hope you go on to the next life with a smile on your face and the knowledge that all of your sins have been forgiven in my eyes, and that I hope you guys reading have as well. May you rest in everlasting peace. And just to add some even more feels to this situation, a song that perfectly describes the relationship the Inquisitor and Jacqueline held is "All Our Days" from the anime RWBY, sung by Casey Lee Williams. It's just...perfect.

Also the King of Kings himself has now been added to **FanficCollective** , go look up **Arthur Pendragon** on the wiki and take a gander at what he looks like. Just like Dreivas, I pay homage for the base image I based his character off of from Megami Tensei's Izanagi no Ookami. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 32 - My Beloved Inquisitor**

"Is he dead? The Inquisitor?" asked Wave when Tatsumi, Esdeath and Arthur returned to the small clearing their friends were at.

By now Lubbock, Leone, Chelsea and Run had all been treated and healed and we're back on their feet looking good as new, the miracle healing power of Solomon's blood coming to their air once again.

"Yes...he is dead." replied Arthur with a heavy breath, Maya's eyes gravitating to the large cut out portion of his body that started just above his left hip and going all the way up to underneath his armpit, as well as the charred and perfectly clean-cut stump that used to be his left arm.

"Why are your injuries not healing themselves?" she asked, Arthur glancing down at them and sighing heavily.

"I can only assume it was because of that man's Trump Card. My core is still intact and undamaged, I can feel it, but for some reason I can't regenerate the portions of my body that were lost to it." he explained.

"So it won't grow back?"

He shook his head. "No, unfortunately."

"Well, all I can say is thank you for risking your life for us, your Highness." said Najenda with a grin as she extended her hand out to Arthur as if she were meeting him for the first time all over again, the Teigu stabbing his sword into the ground and shaking it.

"You're welcome, and I'm no royalty. That chance has come and gone, so for now, I'm just simply Arthur."

They all left the clearing and returned back to the opposite side of the raised landmass, everyone besides, Arthur, Tatsumi and Esdeath seeing for themselves the corpses of Dreivas and the Inquisitor resting in the grass just a mere few yards apart. Arthur walked back over to the Inquisitor and after seeing the smile on his face he guessed that the man passed away content with his circumstances.

"Bastard." snarled Chelsea when she laid eyes upon the man, and almost instantly Arthur let loose an aura so intense that it blew her hair back and shocked her beyond belief.

"You have no right to say that if you don't know what he's been through. I saw and heard for myself his volitions...he was simply a man fighting for the wrong side. I could tell from his eyes alone that he regretted every sinful act he ever committed, but he did them so that he could protect and care for the person closest to him." said Arthur darkly with a glare back at her, Chelsea apologizing immediately afterwards.

At the behest of Arthur they dug a hole in the earth for their enemy and he put the Inquisitor to rest, giving him a proper burial out of his respect for his strength and ideals. Afterwards he turned his intention to Dreivas, instructing Tatsumi to hand him his sword since he had put it down to help with the Inquisitor. When he had his longsword in his grasp he used the very tip of it as a wedge to pull of the white mask that acted as the dead Teigu's face, revealing the wiring and machinery underneath it.

"Why are you taking that?" asked Run as Arthur motioned for Wave to hand him Solomon's satchel so he could place it inside.

"I don't know, but...I have a feeling that we'll be needing it in the near future. It may have to do with the Six Armors Series."

"Speaking of that, now that you've regained your memories, is there anything that you can tell us about the supposed first armor in the series?" asked Esdeath as she crossed her arms over her chest. "We already know that you're Armor No. 2, Dreivas was No. 3, and that Tyrannus, Grand Chariot and Imperator are Armors 4 through 6."

Arthur rubbed his chin in thought for a few moments before his eyes widened when a memory popped into his head of when he first met with Reeze, the scientist who came up with the idea of the Six Armors Series, and how he talked with him about the very first armor.

"Actually, yes, I do."

Immediately everyone grew silent and stood perfectly still, all eyes going to Arthur as he cleared his throat and recalled the conversation between him and Reeze.

"When I first envisioned the Teigu, and I shared this idea with my brother of course, I imagined the first six being used by myself and my most trusted and strongest soldiers. Before I suffered my terrible injury I had already heard from Reeze, the scientist in charge of crafting the six armors, that he had completed Armor No. 1. It was to be used solely by myself and anyone who possesses the blood of the Royal Family, and that it was to be extraordinarily powerful."

"Um...how powerful are we talking about here? Like, Tatsumi and Esdeath powerful?" asked Chelsea somewhat nervously.

Arthur fixed his stone-cold gaze on her and stated, "From what I could tell from Reeze, he said that it was, and I quote, "Powerful enough to wipe out anything that threatens the safety of the Empire and its people." And when I say anything, I mean _anything_."

Chelsea gulped and Tatsumi paled at the thought of something that powerful even existing, and from this fact as a base point his imagination began to fly off in every direction possible and create outlandish images of what this Teigu could be. Esdeath, in an attempt to be more rational with the truth, asked, "Do you know of its name and abilities, by chance. Maybe its appearance as well?"

"Sadly I never got to see what it looked like or what it could do, but I do remember what it's name was." replied Arthur with a heavy sigh.

"What was it?"

"The name we christened it with was Imperial Guardian: Shikoutazer."

With their now questions satisfied Arthur slipped off his tattered trench coat and discarded it, reaching down for the coat Dreivas wore afterwards and using some unknown method he transformed its black, dark maroon and green color scheme to the white, blue, purple and gold his previous one had. He put his right arm through one sleeve and used it to pull on the rest of his coat, the fabric covering up the damage his body had sustained once he zipped it up, and adjusted the left shoulder to fit over his so that the empty sleeve could hang at his side.

They leaped off the edge of the raised earthen platform and landed back down in the forest below, Run doing to honors of using Mastema to get their bearing back in line so they could continue to head for the Western Nations. Now that they had two threats taken care of, they could relax a little bit more then usual.

It was still a long trek to the border, so any relaxation they were offered with would be accepted in a heartbeat.

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

"Come one Kahfka, we have a lot of work today in the torture chambers before we can begin fortifying the capital. I want to get it done as soon as possible." said Jacqueline over her shoulder as they walked down one of the less crowded streets on the capital, Kahfka rolling her eyes grinning.

"You seem cheery today, why's that?" she said jokingly while she rolled her eyes.

Jacqueline stopped for a moment and turned slightly towards her, a glint in her eye as she reached for Kahfka's hand and held it up so they both could see the golden ring resting comfortably around her ring finger.

"It's because I just got married to the most beautiful woman ever…" she said softly, Kahfka's cheeks turning bright red in embarrassment.

They returned to the Reconditioning Department and while the torturers prepared the duo's next group of victims they retreated into Jacqueline's personal chamber for a few minutes. Before she could close the door her mind drifted off in wonder of the Inquisitor's well being and if he was okay, and not even a fraction of a second later her heart skipped a beat. Kahfka turned around when she heard her stop and raised an eyebrow in concern, since she had gone totally silent now and was staring down at the floor with wide eyes.

Jacqueline slowly brought her hand up to her chest, the feeling she was experiencing now unmistakeable. She could always know when the Inquisitor was okay or not because of her bones that had been implanted into his body, and she took comfort knowing that he was alright as long as she could feel his presence through them.

But now...she felt nothing. Instead of the calming and warm aura he gave off, there was only a dark and empty void.

" _N-No...H-He….he wouldn't...he…_ " she thought when her lower lip started to quiver, Kahfka now fully turning around and going up next to her.

"Jacqueline, are you okay?" What's wrong?" she asked, desperate to know an answer, but before she could get one Jacqueline lost all feeling in her legs and she collapsed to her knees.

Traces of tears began to appear in the corner of her eyes when she realized that the empty void her chest wasn't some trick or illusion. The Inquisitor, her protector, her guardian, the person who had been by her side through thick and thin ever since she was only five years old...was gone. She could clearly feel it, the bones that were implanted inside his body weren't picking up any life signs from him whatsoever, no matter how many times she tried to find something, a hint that points to him still being alive.

"He...h-he promised…" she stuttered, Kahfka wondering just who the hell she was talking about.

"Who promised?"

Jacqueline's own heart shattered when everything came crashing down all at once, her memories of the Inquisitor, both good and bad, rushing into her head like some torrential downpour of water so mighty that nothing could stand in its path. The day he saved her from those bullies flashed through her mind, followed by the day he adopted her right out of the blue and became her legal guardian. The overwhelming sadness and despair from realizing she would never again see his smile again was enough to break her on the inside, so much so that only one emotion could be expressed.

Without saying a word she stood up, briskly turned around with tears streaming down her face, and approached the first of twenty people whom the torturers had assembled just outside of her personal chamber. They stood behind the group as per custom to receive their orders, but instead of that...they were treated to a bloody horror show alongside Kahfka, who had remained in the doorway with mouth agape.

In a blind mix of unrivaled fury and unquenchable sorrow, Jacqueline slaughtered all twenty of them without any regard for their pleading and screams. She didn't stop until their bodies were drowning in the ocean of blood she had created around her, the red liquid drenching her skin, clothes and hair from the massacre.

After the last body fell she completely broke down and fell to her knees, Kahfka appearing at her side in an instant to try and comfort her. With a glare scarier then death itself she sent the torturers away so that she could help Jacqueline through whatever event had transpired.

"What happened…?" asked Kahfka quietly, Jacqueline looking at her with teary eyes and sniffing.

"He...H-he's dead...Roman, he's…"

"Roman?"

"T-The Inquisitor…"

Kahfka felt like she had been hit by a ton of boulders. Now she understood why Jacqueline was in such a state of despair...her best friend and protector had been killed. She had learned from her that the Inquisitor had been the one to adopt her and become her legal guardian, and just the thought of finding out that you would never be able to see him again was heart breaking. So, instead of trying to make it better through words, she gingerly wrapped her arms around Jacqueline and embraced her tightly, the Great General not caring about the eyes watching her and crying into her shoulder.

They sat on the bloodied floor, surrounded by the victims of Jacqueline's sorrow-induced slaughter, for a good while until she recovered enough for Kahfka to bring her to her feet and walk her back into her personal chamber. The next day a platoon of Imperial Scouts returned from the area the Inquisitor and Dreivas were last at and, with faces devoid of any emotion, they returned to the Imperial Capital with the bodies of the two in tow. Dreivas was going to be scrapped for parts since his core had been destroyed, and on strict orders from Kahfka the Inquisitor was taken directly to the cemetery where the Three Beasts, Great General Budo, and countless other Imperial Military members had been buried. Another thing she had ordered to have done was the Inquisitor's grave be built as a shrine, only accessible by Jacqueline and herself, so that there was no threat of his final resting place getting desecrated.

There was no funeral service, the Inquisitor's casket was instead lowered silently into the ground by a squad of Faceless, with Jacqueline, Kahfka, the Emperor and Honest standing a few feet away. They offered their condolences before departing with the Faceless, leaving Kahfka and Jacqueline alone with their thoughts. She looked over at her partner and she felt her heart tighten again when Jacqueline's eyes started to tear up again.

"You promised me...that you would always be by my side…" she murmured, referring to the Inquisitor as she stared at the gravestone marked with his name.

Her knees wobbled as she collapsed into the soft grass, her hands balling up into fists and trembling. However, instead of another bout of rage coming from within like before, her shoulders dropped and she wrapped her arms around herself and began to sob quietly again.

"Why...Why would you leave me?!" she asked through the tears, her heart once again breaking. "You were my friend, my guardian, the one who would take care of me!"

Kahfka was struggling to keep herself from breaking down as she watched Jacqueline unleash all of her bottled up emotions, the Inquisitor's life being the catalyst that opened the floodgates. At first she felt saddened for her and the tragedy she' just suffered, but the more she thought about it...the more these emotions began to morph into unrivaled fury that consumed her heart, mind and very soul.

She tightened her left fist and could feel her blood begin to boil, Demon's Extract responding to it by generating an influx of power that began to manifest as several ice crystals coming from her hair, giving her the appearance of a horned ice demon. She quickly put her emotions under wraps and kneeled down in front of Jacqueline, the Great General pausing in her sobbing to look up at Kahfka and the determined expression on her face.

"Jacqueline, listen to me. If the Inquisitor was still here right now, he wouldn't want you to be crying. Knowing him, he'd want to see you to smile instead since he liked to see it."

She took the time to wipe away Jacqueline's tears and cupped her cheeks, a sincere smile on her face. "I'm hurting too, believe me when I say that. He was a great friend and I'm glad I got to know him, but he would want you to go on and keep going for your goal."

"Y-Yeah…" stuttered Jacqueline as she slowly came back to her senses.

"You still have me too, Jacqy. And I swear I'm gonna make them pay for killing the Inquisitor. Even if I only manage to catch one of them, I'll slaughter them for making you cry." said Kahfka with meaning in her voice, Jacqueline's eyes widening a fraction of an inch before she finally smiled.

"I knew there was a reason why I married you…" she said with joy, Kahfka giggling a little as she embraced her and finally felt the stress leave her partner's system for good.

They stayed with their friend for a few more minutes, silently sharing their company with the Inquisitor for one last time before Jacqueline decided that they had spent enough time here. She stood up and with Kahfka's hand in her own they said one final goodbye to the Inquisitor before leaving. After a few feet she glanced back over her shoulder and smiled when, even though it was probably just her imagination, she saw a ghostly image of the Inquisitor sitting on his headstone with a book in his hand. Suddenly he looked up from it and smiled as he waved at her, as if to say that he'll be fine now, before he adjusted his bifocals and returned to reading the book.

" _Goodbye Roman...thank you so much for everything that you've done._ " thought Jacqueline with a teary-eyed smile as she watched a younger version of herself appear by the Inquisitor's side and hopped up into his lap in order to hug him, the two beginning to laugh. " _I'll miss you._ "

Thirty minutes later after taking it slow through the capital's streets, they arrived back at the Reconditioning Department where, before entering, Jacqueline grabbed Kahfka by the shoulders and looked her dead-square in the eyes.

"Okay, before you leave, take this advice. They'll be expecting another attack from us considering the nigh consecutive assaults by the Inquisitor and Dreivas, so when you do manage to find them in the Western Nations, which I'm pretty sure is where they went, don't attack them immediately. Wait until they least expect it, and when their backs are turned...make them pay."

Kahfka nodded and Jacqueline grinned as she opened the door and began the descent into the torture chambers so that she could retrieve her trench coat while Kahfka gathered all of the necessary supplies she needed. After getting a small backpack and slinging it over her shoulder once she slipped on her own trench coat, she bid her farewell and returned to the surface with her old Shingu, Cypher, in hand.

She didn't want to reveal herself as a user of Demon's Extract immediately once she found her opening to strike, instead going for the surprise reveal that would drop their guards, so she retrieved her old weapon that she was still quite fond of.

There wasn't much in her backpack either, just a couple of water bottles and a blanket so she wouldn't get cold, and she was thankful for that since she needed to move fast to catch up with Night Raid and the Jaegers.

" _I don't have to worry about eating that much either since Anton put these machines inside of me that regulate all that sciency stuff. All I really need to do is drink water and I should be fine._ " she thought to herself with a smirk before leaping into the air and landing on a building opposite of the Reconditioning Department.

She looked out over the Imperial Capital and glanced at the palace for a few moments before she raised up her other hand and snapped her fingers, a horse made entirely out of ice manifesting at her side in a matter of seconds and huffing out a cloud of super-cold breath. She leaped onto its back and created a handle for her to hold onto in between its shoulder blades, the ice horse neighing loudly before darting off the building towards the wall.

As she got closer and closer, her lips curled up into a devilish smile the more she thought of all the various ways she would torture and rip apart those who had killed her friend and made her lover cry. There was no doubt about it now. There will be bloodshed.


	34. The Western Nations

A/N Guys, Jacqueline may be a sadistic and cruel individual, but come on...I can't help but feel sad for her. She lost the one person, before Kahfka that is, that looked after and genuinely cared for her over everyone else. He even adopted her so that she wouldn't have to stay at that orphanage for any longer, and now he's gone. Damn. But he went out like a badass though. And Kahfka...with her as she is right now...shit is gonna hit the fan at Mach 2. And what's even worse? Tatsumi, Esdeath and the others have _no_ idea what she's got in store for them. *Dramatic and ominous music begins to play*. PREPARE THY FACES. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 33 - The Western Nations**

 **\- Western Border of the Empire -**

 **\- Four Days Later -**

It had taken them all several weeks, and along the way they had encounters that had cost them valuable time, energy, and the life of a dear friend...but finally, they had arrived. The border that separates the Empire from the nations of the West, the one resting directly before them being the nation of Tesla. To the northwest would be the nation of Delarus, and past both of them was the largest of them all the home of the capital city, Teppelin.

Only, this wasn't going to be the friendly Western Nations they were walking into. This was territory under the complete control of the Empire, their enemies consisting of a special division from the Imperial Military just as infamous as Esdeath's former army.

"So, Mine…" started Maya with a glance at the pink-haired sniper as they crossed over into Tesla. "How does it feel to be back home?"

Mine clenched her jaw muscles and her hand's grip around the strap fro Pumpkin's carrying case tightened. She clearly wasn't happy to be back at home while it was occupied from the Empire, but underneath all of that hate there was still some other emotions of happiness that showed she was glad to be back.

"I'm pissed off that Jacqueline would actually take over my home like this…god how I wish I could put a hole through her head." she growled, Najenda chuckling over on the side at her enthusiasm.

They approached a small gathering of trees and, thanks to her finely tuned sixth sense, Esdeath immediately sensed a presence waiting just beyond them and brought a hand up to her rapier's hilt, which told the others to stop and scan their surroundings.

"Hold up! I'm not an enemy!" exclaimed a voice from the trees, the sudden outburst catching them off guard.

Seemingly from the plants themselves emerged a man covered from head to toe in camouflage, the disguise so well-done try wouldn't have been able to see him if he hadn't shown himself.

"Who are you?" asked Tatsumi, who was still uneasy about this person considering their previous encounters thus far.

"I'm a spy sent by the Western Nations resistance to meet up with you and take you back to our headquarters. We got a message from the Revolutionary Army that you would be coming."

"I apologize that it took us so long. On the way here we encountered some...unfortunate circumstances." said Arthur humbly, the spy shaking his head as if to dismiss the matter away.

"It's fine, I'm just glad that you're finally here. Come on, follow me." said the spy with a turn, the man walking towards the trees he emerged from.

"Aren't you worried about getting spotted or found out by the occupying force? The Hellraisers are no laughing matter." asked Najenda once they walked under the cover of the treetops.

The spy chuckled and glanced back over his shoulder, saying, "We know that, but we're fine out here. They're all concentrated in New Kannath, the capital city over in Teppelin. As long as we stay along the outskirts we should be able to slip past and get to the Tyrann Mountain Range, which is where the remainder of the former Western Nations government and military resides."

"They're _all_ in the capital? How many troops do you still have anyways?" asked Wave.

"Hmm...around a hundred thousand I think. The Hellraisers have at least fifty thousand troops stationed in and around the capital."

"Then what's stopping you from taking back the capital? Hostages?"

The spy's smile vanished and he stopped, his body becoming rigid. He fully turned around to face them and shoved his hands into his vest pockets while scowling at the ground, which meant there was a far worse reason as to why the Western Nations hadn't tried to liberate themselves from the occupying Imperial forces.

"In a sense, but it's not just the capital's population...it's the entire population of the Western Nations _itself_." he said ominously, Tatsumi, Esdeath and the rest of the group getting chills at the way he said it.

"What do you mean…?" asked Chelsea in a low voice.

"I don't know what it is, every person we've sent to try and get close has vanished off the radar, so we can assume that they were discovered, but...they have something just outside the capital, a weapon of sorts." explained the spy, his mood souring even more. "I _have_ seen what it can do first hand...and it's like hell on earth."

The air surrounding the group instantly grew heavier, their imaginations getting to work again and crafting all sorts of possibilities of what could be the hellish weapon this man was describing. However, they all came to the same conclusion after a few moments of silence, and to speak for them all Run crossed his eyes and sighed heavily.

"Could this weapon possibly be a Teigu?" he asked, the spy looking up at him and kicking a small rock with his foot.

"I don't know for sure, but it definitely has the destructive power of one."

When no more questions were asked the spy continued leading them through the countryside of Tesla, the rolling green hills a stark contrast to the dense forests and rocky and craggy areas they had gone through to reach the Western Nations. After a good while the spy told them they had just entered Teppelin, and with a finger he pointed to several columns of smoke rising into the sky in the distance.

"That's where the capital is, New Kannath. And just beyond that for a couple of miles is the Tyrann Mountain Range. That's our destination." he said, Tatsumi squinting his eyes for a few moments before an idea popped into his head.

"Wait a minute, I have an idea." he said, the spy looking back at him with a raised eyebrow and a look of intrigue on his face. "My Teigu, Tyrannus, it allows me to go invisible. I can sneak into the capital and catch a glance at that weapon for you guys and tell you ."

The spy's aloof expression morphed to shock at his proposition, and to prove to him that it's possible Tatsumi activated Tyrannus and in an instant disappeared from view.

"Are you sure about that?"

"Trust me, I've done something like this before. I just hope I won't get thrown into a wall this time around." said Tatsumi after becoming visible again and glancing at Esdeath, who rolled her eyes.

"Just be safe, okay?" she asked as she hugged him, Tatsumi wrapping both arms around her and holding her tightly for a few seconds before letting go to begin his journey.

"Meet us at the foot of the Tyrann Mountains! I'll be waiting for you!" exclaimed the spy by cupping his hands to his mouth,Tatsumi giving him a thumbs up as he sprinted in the direction of the capital.

As he ran through the uninhabited countryside of Teppelin he took the time to appreciate the change in scenery from the usual terrain of the Empire and its vast territory, the golden plains that dominated the nation almost calming to him.

" _Maybe when the revolution is over, I can bring Esdeath back here for our honeymoon or something like that. Seems like a nice place._ " he thought to himself with a slight grin.

He arrived at the crest of a hill and he was astounded by the sight that lay before him in the valley below. The city of New Kannath was massive, not as large as the Imperial Capital, but still otherwise a huge city that spanned for miles. Its buildings were some of the most unique he had ever seen, possessing some modern brick styles as well as old, traditional wooden buildings with tiled roofs.

There were factories everywhere, which he discovered were the source of smoke columns he had seen earlier, and he could clearly see that the city itself was spanning out from the center just from the positions of the roads.

" _And I guess that's where the government would have resided in._ " thought Tatsumi when he spotted a fairly large building situated in the center of a large square the city was built around.

He only spent a few more minutes observing New Kannath from afar before he turned invisible and sprinted down the hill towards the front gate of the city, the signs of the Empire's occupation becoming evident when he drew near. There were several soldiers stationed at the gate, and he was surprised to see that even though they were members of the Imperial Army, the Hellraisers battle attire differed greatly from their counterparts.

Instead of the standard grey shirt, pants and helmet, they wore dark grey fatigue uniforms made of a multilayer carbon fiber fabric that renders it waterproof, fireproof and acid proof as well as shrapnel. Armored gloves and boots covered their feet and hands, and over their uniform they wore body armor that provides good protections against handheld weapons and decent protection against bullets. Helmets constructed of a more durable material then the standard Imperial Soldier's protected their heads from blunt-force weapons and over their mouths they wear a breathing apparatus that allows them to breath underwater for a certain amount of time and protects them from airborne chemicals.

He had heard from Esdeath of the Surprise and Attack Division, the Hellraisers' actual name, and now that he was seeing some of their members for himself...he finally understood why they were so infamous. Anyone going up against soldiers that looked as terrifying as them would be scared senseless.

However, even with all of their training they were unable to sense Tatsumi as he leaped clear over the wall and entered the city streets to begin his search for the so-called "weapon" that spy had talked about. As he walked past the citizens of the Western Nation he was surprised to see that the Empire's occupation wasn't really having a terrible toll on the populace like one would expect, which led him to believe that the Lieutenant Colonel in charge of the Hellraisers wasn't some psychotic or vicious deviant like some of the others he's seen.

" _Now...if I were an insanely powerful weapon, where would I be?_ " thought Tatsumi as he jumped to the top of a building in order to get a better view of his surroundings.

He looked around from one end of the city to the other, and to his frustration he found no sign of a weapon within the city itself. Then he had a thought, if what the spy had said was true and that it was indeed devastating and it was literally holding the Western Nations in its entirety hostage...it wouldn't even be in the city in the first place.

He grinned at his revelation and looked to the outskirts of the city opposite of his location, and sure enough he could barely make out a couple of figures making their way up the large hill in his view. It took him only a few moments to reach the spot where he had seen the men and upon scaling the face of the hill he stood at its peak and realized that what the spy said had been true. The weapon resting before him in another large valley was something only the devil himself could've crafted, with its massive size and the colossal cannon it sported.

"W-What the hell…" he murmured, the giant cannon sending chills running up and down his spine when he imagined just what kind of destruction it could cause.

The gun barrel itself was the largest he had ever seen, and the heavily armored tracked apparatus it was built on made the Hellraiser soldiers walking or standing around it look like ants. His curiosity got the better of him and he jogged down the hill towards it, wanting to get a closer look and figure out more concerning this titanic weapon of war. When the coast was clear he leaped up onto the platform next to the barrel and landed as quiet as a cat, his armored toes making not a sound when they hit the metal decking. There were more soldiers up here, and due to the smaller walking space he had to be especially careful to not bump into anyone so as to not reveal his presence to them.

"Commanding Officer present!"

" _Shit._ "

Tatsumi stood rigidly still to make it as hard as possible for him to be sensed while all of the soldiers stood at attention with their feet spread shoulder width apart and their hands clasped behind their backs. From a ladder built into the side of one of the machine's massive armored tracks climbed up a man who definitely separated himself from the others by not only his manner of dress, but by the way he carried himself. There was an air of superiority around him, and it took mere seconds for Tatsumi to guess this was none other then the Lieutenant Colonel in command of the Hellraisers, the infamous "Hell's Warden".

He definitely looked the part of one too, with a gas mask with eyeholes tinted red covering the entirety of his face, baggy pants, a heavy coat, elbow and knee guards as well as armored boots and gloves, and a metal bowl helmet atop his head. Every breath he took sounded deep and ominous like some robot, and Tatsumi shivered when he felt the man's aura wash over him.

"At ease." he said in a deep, gravely voice, the soldiers relaxing their stances somewhat as he observed them through the eyeholes of his gas mask.

"Anything to report?"

"No sir, another quiet day." replied a soldier, the Lieutenant Colonel nodding his head once before he turned to look at the barrel of the gun pointing up into the sky next to him.

"What of the status of Hræsvelgr?" he asked, Tatsumi's eyes widening at the revealing of the war machine's name.

"Corpse Swallower: Hræsvelgr is ready for firing, and thanks to constant maintenance by our engineers we now have the capability of firing it consecutively without worry of the barrel overheating."

" _Corpse Swallower: Hræsvelgr...so it really is a Teigu. Who in their right mind would make something like this…_ " thought Tatsumi as the Lieutenant Colonel slowly walked past him.

He only went for a few more feet before he froze up, his head slowly turning back over his shoulder at the area where Tatsumi was standing in. Tatsumi saw this he he started to get a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach.

"Is there something wrong sir?" asked a soldier next to him, the Hellraiser commander fully turning around and staring intensely at the invisible Tatsumi.

Without a word, the Lieutenant Colonel retraced his steps and stood just a few inches away from Tatsumi, the Jaeger starting to sweat bullets at the sight of the man up close and personal. His arms appeared out from behind his back and Tatsumi could see his fingers clench up tightly, as if he were anticipating a fist-fight. If he was going to escape, it was now or never.

"We have an intruder!" shouted a soldier from the ground, the Lieutenant Colonel whirling around and grinning behind his mask when he recognized a new, but familiar presence among his troops.

"Now things are getting exciting!" he said before sprinted to the edge of Hræsvelgr and vaulted himself over the side, dropping down to the ground and coming face to face with the intruder, who was being held at gunpoint by his men.

Tatsumi snuck his way to the edge in order to get a glimpse as well and he was flabbergasted at the sight of the person who had infiltrated the encampment. It was a woman easily in her early twenties with waist-length teal hair and fair skin, and she wore a highly revealing outfit reminiscent of a ninja with facemask, a belt with twin segmented armor plates, and a matching headpiece. From where he was he could see that she had her right eye open and her left eye closed, which he couldn't figure out the reason why.

The Lieutenant Colonel, however, was in a state of total shock upon laying eyes on the person who had infiltrated his camp. "Fiona…? Is that you?"

The girl's eyes widened when she recognized the voice from the Hellraiser commander and her whole posture softened a little, which told Tatsumi there was a whole other relationship and story shared between these two.

"Hey Rafe...funny meeting you here, huh?" she said with a small wave.

"Yes, indeed it is. Although, I wish we could've met under different circumstances."

"Yeah...if only."

Rafe brought around his hands and cracked his knuckles, Fiona tensing up and reaching up to the hilt of a katana hanging in its sheath from her waist. He noticed the weapon and just from its appearance he could assume that it wasn't some ordinary blade, and that there was more to it then meets the eye.

"Even if you possess a Teigu, you won't be able to leave here so easily." stated Rafe before he held his hand out to the side and to Tatsumi's shock a intensely hot pillar of fire not colored the normal red, orange and yellow, but pitch _black,_ manifested itself next to him and consumed his arm and hand.

A few seconds passed before he swung his arm out of the fire as it dissipated, a chainsaw at least twelve feet long now in his grasp and letting loose an extreme amount of heat from its spinning chain.

"Behold, the instrument of my name as Hell's Warden. Ten Thousand Suns: Amaterasu!" bellowed Rafe as black fire roared to life around him, Fiona having to take a few steps back and shield her eyes and face from the outrageous heat emanating from the weapon.

She wasn't worried, however, because she had her insurance already in her fingertips. Quick as a flash, she drew her katana from its sheath and stabbed the black blade into the earth, her hair standing on end when lightning began to lance around her and her weapon.

"Thunder Gate!"

From the darkened sky above, Rafe and Tatsumi just now noticing the weather change, two enormous bolts of lightning shot down into the grass on either side of Fiona and created a devastating explosion of electricity that knocked back all of Rafe's men around her and blinded the Lieutenant Colonel for a few seconds.

With her opponent's guard lowered she rushed him and lunged at his gut with her katana, but to her surprise he brought around Amaterasu and deflected her attack easily.

"Flame-Wrapping Coffin." said Rafe darkly before his free hand was enveloped with black fire and he threw his arm at her face.

Recognizing danger when she saw it Fiona, to everyone's amazement again, actually *split into two perfect copies of herself and while the real one leaped away to safety, the clone was grasped tightly by Rafe over the face and in an instant it was consumed by black fire. Before it could turn to ash, however, the clone dissipated into nothingness like a mirage, Rafe chuckling to himself as he looked up at Fiona as she sheathed her katana.

"I presume that was your Teigu's Trump Card? Shadow clones?" he asked, Fiona glaring at him silently. "I'll take that as a yes. It's very versatile and useful if I do say so myself, since it allows you to avoid danger quite easily."

Suddenly black fire came to life around Amaterasu and created a shape similar to a sword, the weapon's length nearly tripling as Rafe poured more of his power into the technique.

"However, don't play with fire if you aren't expecting to get burned! Sword of Kagutsuchi!" proclaimed Rafe as he swung Amaterasu in a wide arc, the blade of black fire shooting right for Fiona's right side and threatening to cleave her in two.

She brought out her sword and got ready to deflect the fire blade, but what she didn't know was that this technique was the Lieutenant Colonel's strongest offensive attack that could cut through practically anything...even other Teigu.

" _Come on..._ " thought Rafe as his weapon closed in on the ninja.

"Dragon Scaled Layered Defense!"

Rafe's eyes shot wide open when his technique struck a red ethereal barrier surrounding Fiona and hardly scratched it, and before either he or Fiona could react Tatsumi turned visible and landed on the grass in between them, Neuntote in his grasp.

He glanced back at Fiona and stared hard at her for a fraction of a second as he reared back with his other hand.

"Run." was all he said before smacking his palm to the ground. "Draconian Ascension!"

Rafe pulled himself away when a huge column of fire erupted from the earth around Tatsumi, obscuring him and Fiona from the Lieutenant Colonel and his men. In the few seconds the fire would be present Tatsumi motioned up with his finger and Fiona nodded, the pair leaping high up into the air and quickly vacating the area and sprinting towards the less dangerous city.

"Sir, do you want us to pursue them?" asked a Hellraisers soldier once the flames Tatsumi had manifested vanished, Rafe lowering his weapon and shaking his head.

"No, we need to figure out a new plan of action. That man was one of the Jaegers, and if one of them is here...then Esdeath and the others must be as well." replied Rafe as he smirked, his sense beginning to tingle.

" _Seems the flames of war have changed yet again. I wonder what will happen next?_ "

Meanwhile, back in the capital, Tatsumi and Fiona stopped atop a fairly large factory building and seeing that they weren't being pursued, the Jaeger let out a sigh of relief and deconstructed his spear.

"You okay?" he asked of Fiona, the ninja nodding her head as she crossed her arms over her chest.

"Yeah, thank you for that, but I would've been able to dodge that attack by substituting myself with a Shadow Clone."

"No problem, I guess. And the name's Tatsumi, by the way. I'm one of the Jaegers." said Tatsumi while holding a hand out to her, Fiona shaking it and opening her other eye in the process.

"A pleasure."

"I want to ask you something." started Tatsumi after Tyrannus faded away, the index finger of his right hand motioning upwards to her left eye and it's unique appearance. "Well, two things actually. One, what's up with your eye, and two, why'd you keep it closed back there?"

Fiona chuckled a little as she uncrossed her arms and rested a hand on her katana's hilt. "Well, for starters, this isn't really my original eye. It was a gift from a friend."

"A friend?" asked Tatsumi, his curiosity now peaked.

"Yeah. He was the one that gave me this Teigu, actually. The name it was given, Lightning Cutter: Kaminari, comes directly from the name of the Danger Beast it was crafted from." she explained with a small smile, the pair finding a spot to sit on the edge of the roof to catch their breath. "Kaminari, unlike most Super-class Danger Beasts, is actually kind and benevolent, wanting instead to make peace instead of wage war. So when the First Emperor came here, instead of putting up a fight, the dragon willingly allowed him to take one of its teeth to forge this Teigu on the condition that once it was no longer in use, it was to be returned to him."

"Fascinating. And it was brought back, just like he had promised?"

Fiona nod her head. "Yeah, and Kaminari looked after the blade until I happened to come across the Danger Beast while training and, through our conversations, we became friends. Which is why when he was attacked by another hostile dragon, I defended him with his Teigu and, in the process, I lost my left eye."

She reached up and gingerly touched the scar she had crossing over her the green and yellow slit-pupil eye, another laugh escaping her lips. Tatsumi could already guess what happened afterwards, but instead of interrupting her he remained quiet and allowed her to finish her story.

"So, as a thank you, he not only gifted me this Teigu, but he gave me one of his eyes too. I still don't know what kind of technique he used to do it, but he transferred his sight into my blinded eye and healed it." she finished before she looked at him again and removed her hand from the scar. "And about your second question, the reason why I kept it closed is because I'm keeping my promise to Kaminari. He doesn't ever want to see war, so while in battle I always close this eye so that even though he's not here, he still won't have to experience the horrors of war."

Now that she had finished her story she couldn't help but notice that even though he had deactivated his own Teigu, his eyes still maintained the red color and cross-slit pupils, so she couldn't stop herself from asking about them and why they like like that.

He told her about meeting Tyrant and how at first the Danger Beast had fused his Teigu to him, and then during his fight against the late Great General Budo, Tatsumi and Tyrant had fused together to become a hybrid between human and Danger Beast.

"As a result, my eyes will permanently look like this as long as I keep Tyrannus fused to myself. When the day that I relinquish my Teigu comes, my eyes with return back to their old green color as soon as it separates from my body."

"That's...interesting, to say the least." replied Fiona before standing up and stretching her back, Tatsumi doing the same.

"So if you came here, where's the rest of the Jaegers?" she asked.

"One of your guys took them to the base of the Turann Mountains, so they'll be waiting for us to return." he said before he suddenly remembered something and stared hard at her while motioning back at where they had come from. "And it seemed like you and the Lieutenant Colonel knew each other. What was up with that?"

"That's kind of personal…"

"Oh, sorry. I won't press any further and leave it at that then."

Now that they had recovered from their escape from the Lieutenant Colonel, they quickly left the capital without being spotted by Hellraiser soldiers and began their trek towards the tall mountains looming in the distance. It took them a little under an hour at the pace they were going, but they made it and just like he had promised, the spy from earlier was waiting for them at the beginning of a trail leading into the mountains and upon seeing them he waved them over.

"Captain? I thought you were still inside the base?" he asked with an inquisitive look, Fiona rubbing the back of her neck and laughing.

"Ah, no. Actually, it seems Tatsumi here had the same idea as me, and he was the one that got me out of a sticky situation with the Lieutenant Colonel." she said, the spy's eyes becoming as wide as the moon.

"You met the Hell's Warden?!" he stammered.

"Yeah, and he has a Teigu too. He's definitely a dangerous fighter."

The spy changed his focus from her to Tatsumi and he asked anxiously, "And what about that weapon? Did you see it?"

"It was pretty hard to miss. It's just outside the capital in a depressed just deep enough to keep it hidden from the populace, and we were right to assume that it was a Teigu. It's name is Corpse Swallower: Hræsvelgr, and it's a gigantic artillery cannon built onto a chassis with tracks so it can move."

"Giant? Um, define giant."

"It's as big as some of the factory buildings in the city." stated Fiona blankly, the spy paling at the thought that such a monstrosity even existed. "However, that could work for us. Considering how big it is it would be very hard for it to maneuver properly, so it's only real use is for long-range bombardment."

"Exactly. If it's overrun, it'll be rendered useless." added on Tatsumi.

"So the only real threat we have to worry about at the moment is the Lieutenant Colonel in command of the Hellraisers?"

Both Tatsumi and Fiona nodded and the spy regained some of the color in his skin, the new information relieving some of the anxiety and stress he had. "Okay, that makes me feel a little better. I'll be sure to tell General Hiruko and the Chairman about this development when we get back. Now, if you'll please follow me."

The spy rotated on his heels and he started to scale the steep trail leading into the mountains, Tatsumi and Fiona following close behind him as they left the warmer environment below and set foot into the colder, more frigid one of the Tyrann Mountains. The path they were one was the only one created to be used to get through the mountains, but it was seldom used considering some portions of it could prove to be fatal to those who didn't watch where they were going.

Thankfully the spy was among the few people that *did know what he was doing, and with his guidance they traversed the beaten path past dizzying cliffs all the way to a large cave in one of the mountains that didn't really look too welcoming.

"Don't worry, it's pretty cozy inside. You'll see." said Fiona with a grin as she removed her face mask, Tatsumi glancing at her with a look of doubt.

They walked underneath the icicle-ridden maw of the cave and he saw for himself why Fiona had said it was cozy inside. Built into one wall of the cavern was a fairly large building built with the traditional style of architecture, the same style he had seen in New Kannath, and he could see that there were people inside scurrying around, probably soldiers or officers of the surviving Western Nations' military.

"Tatsumi!"

His gaze dropped and he smiled as his friends came jogging over to him, the first person to reach him of course being Esdeath, who threw her arms around him and very nearly knocked the wind out f him.

"So did you find out what that weapon was?" asked Wave after Tatsumi and Esdeath finished with their hug.

"Yeah, I'll tell you guys about it in a few. First I want to introduce you guys to a new friend of mine." he replied before he motioned to Fiona, who waved her hand a little.

"This is Fiona, she's a Captain in the Western Nations military."

"Hello." she said with a smile, but before the introductions could continue the entire cave rumbled and everyone turned their attention to another large passageway that led further down into the bowels of the mountain.

"I heard voices. Do we have new visitors?" asked a deep, yet comforting voice from the darkness before a large dragon with white hair and yellow scales emerged.

It looked around with its single eye before it noticed Fiona and it smiled, "Ah, Fiona. It's good to have you back safe and sound."

"Hey Kaminari!" she said happily, the Danger Beast spotting Tatsumi next to her and moving forward so as to lower his head down to their level in order to see him probably.

"And who might you be? A friend of Fiona's?"

"My name's Tatsumi. I'm Esdeath's husband." he said, Kaminari slowly nodding his head when he recognized the name from earlier.

"So you're Tatsumi. It's a pleasure to finally have your acquaintance. And I'm sure Fiona already told you about me?"

"Yeah, she did."

"Well then I guess I don't have to introduce myself. Enjoy your stay here in my humble abode." said Kaminari warmly before turning his long and slender body around and walking back to the cave he had come out of, Najenda motioning with her hand for Tatsumi to follow her to where they were going to stay in the large building after they bid farewell to Fiona.

Once they were settled comfortably within the living room of the floor they had been graciously given, Tatsumi recounted to them his encounter with the weapon the spy had told them about and how that it was in fact a Teigu, which confirmed their worst fears. Afterwards he moved on to tell them of the biggest threat they were going to meet here in Teppelin, which will be the Lieutenant Colonel himself.

"He's exceptionally powerful, and the Teigu he uses is something I've never seen or heard of before." he finished as he leaned back in his chair.

"Ten Thousand Suns: Amaterasu...could it be one of the lost Teigu from the civil war?" asked Leone with a glance at Arthur, since he was the most knowledgeable when it came to these certain things.

"That is a possibility, but I don't know for sure." he replied with a shrug.

"Well, lost Teigu or not, when we end up fighting the Lieutenant Colonel, we need to be ready for him. They don't call him Hell's Warden for nothing." said Esdeath, the entire group agreeing with the statement.

"Well...what do we do now?" asked Chelsea after a few moments of awkward silence.

"Relax, for once. I dunno about you guys, but I'm gonna go take a nice long nap." said Lubbock as he pushed himself out of the chair he was sitting in and walked off to his room, Mine rolling her eyes.

"That sounds like a _great_ idea. See you guys in the morning." said Leone with a grin before she too left to retest into the recesses of her room.

Slowly the members of Night Raid and the Jaegers fanned out of the room to go do their own individual things, most of them following in the footsteps of Lubbock and Leone by going to get some sleep, until the only people that remained were Arthur, Maya, Tatsumi and Esdeath.

"Well, considering how I didn't need sleep, I'm going to see if I can help out around here." stated Arthur before he waved goodbye and left, leaving Maya alone with Tatsumi and Esdeath.

They sat there silently for a few moments before Esdeath remembered something the spy had told them upon arriving at the cave and she tapped Tatsumi on the shoulder to grab his attention.

"You know, they constructed this building over a hot springs. It's on the lowest floor and beneath the ground floor, and I was thinking we could go down there and relax for a while."

"That sounds great. And I'm assuming you have a swimsuit or something with your stuff that you got from Straelka?"

"Duh, of course."

She smirked as she poked him on the nose, her eyes flashing over to the Maya for a fraction of a second afterwards. "Hey, Maya, you want to come too?"

"Huh?!" sputtered Tatsumi while Maya gave her an aloof look and sighed.

"No, I'm fine. I'll stay here."

"I insist. You always look so glum, you should enjoy yourself more often." Esdeath pressed as she stood up and walked over to Maya in order to pull her up to her feet. "Come on, I have a spare that you use."

"Don't I have a say in this?" asked Tatsumi before they could leave, Esdeath looking back at him over her shoulder and grinning mischievous li.

"What? Are you not gonna be able to handle the sight of two women in swimsuits?"

Tatsumi growled at her teasing and gave her the finger, causing her to laugh before she and Maya exited the living room to go find the former's room. When he heard a door shut a little ways off he sighed and decided that of this was going to happen he might as well retrieve his swimming trunks that he had gotten while staying in Straelka as well. He followed the same path Esdeath took and upon arriving at their room he stepped back when the door opened inward, with the former General and Maya walking out from within with Esdeath's swimsuits in hand.

"We'll meet you down there." she said with a wink before striding past him, Tatsumi rolling his eyes again as he stepped inside to find his stuff.

Later he found himself on the lowest flood of the building with his trunks slung over his shoulder and a look of discomfort on his face. He would've been fine if it was just Esdeath and him, but with Maya in the picture...it felt a little awkward to be honest.

" _Fuck it._ " he thought with a shrug as he stepped into the men's changing room that had been constructed close to the hot spring, since it was the only way to get in alongside the women's.

After putting his clothes into a storage locker he inhaled deeply through his nostrils and opened the second door in the room, the one leading out to the spring. He pushed it open and instantly his skin was assaulted by the humid steam the hot spring was producing, sweat droplets almost instantly forming on his forehead.

"Tatsumi, over here!" said Esdeath from the waters of the spring a few yards away from him.

When he approached the water's edge after walking through the steam he became mesmerized by what he came to. He already knew Esdeath and Maya were probably the most beautiful women he had ever met, with Leone and Fiona sitting in the same boat with them, but for some reason seeing them in bikinis with beads of sweat on their bodies from the steam was making it _extremely_ hard to focus and think properly.

He quickly shook himself out of his stupor and carefully stepped down into the thigh-deep water, and almost instantly he felt all of the stress and tension in his limbs melt away as he sprawled his legs out in order to submerge houseful up to his chest. A long sigh of relief came out from behind his lips as he leaned back against the smoothed out wall of the pool and let his body lose all sense of feeling to the miracle water.

"Oh god...that is the best feeling ever...of all time." he murmured with pure ecstasy lacing his words, Esdeath giggling as she scooted over to him so he could put an arm around her shoulder.

Maya on the other hand remained still and was awkwardly trying to make herself look smaller since she had never been seen like this before. She had always primarily wore her armor as her clothing, deactivating only to sleep at night, so everything happening now was an entirely new experience.

"Loosen up a little Maya, it's fine. You're among friends." said Tatsumi once he noticed, Maya looking at him with cheeks redder then a tomato before she did what he said and relaxed her limbs a little more and stopped trying to hide her curves and bust from view.

"Better."

Maya smiled a little and she closed her eyes as she let out a heavy sigh, her worries of being judged washing away alongside all of the bottled up stress she had as a result of being the infamous Arius Magress. The three of them sat like that in silence, letting the water work its magic on their tired limbs while they felt truly at ease for the first time in months, for a good while before Maya shifted and opened her eyes to look at the couple.

"So, Tatsumi, I remember you saying that you two have a daughter back in the Eastern Nation. What's her name?" she asked, Tatsumi cracking open an eye at her question.

"Lucena. Her name's Lucena."

"That's a wonderful name. Which of you came up with it?"

"Tatsumi did." spoke up Esdeath with a smile as she opened her eyes and snuggled up against him with her head resting on his shoulder.

Maya nod her head and she resumed her resting, which continued on for a couple of more minutes until she had her fill and stood up from the waters in order to stretch and rid her back of the soreness.

"I know I was being difficult at first, but...thanks for bringing me here. I've been needing this for a while."

"Of course, it's what friends do." said Tatsumi, Maya blushing somewhat at his kindness before she stepped out of the water and retrieved a towel in order to dry herself off before leaving.

Esdeath watched her leave out of the corner of her eyes and when he saw her fully disappear into the women's changing room, she surprised Tatsumi by quickly throwing her leg over him and sitting on his midsection while wrapping her arms around his neck.

"What's up?" he asked, Esdeath giving him her signature grin before leaning forward and pressing her breasts against his chest.

"You know...it's been a long time since we were able to have some alone time after having Lucena. And now that Maya's gone...I can't hold myself back any longer." started Esdeath while she reached around her neck and began to pull on the strings of her bikini top.

With one fluid motion she stripped off the swimsuit piece and tossed it to the side, freeing her large breasts from their confinement. Without another word Tatsumi started to suck on one, his tongue twirling softly around the pink nipple making Esdeath bite her lip to keep a whimper from escaping past them. Unfortunately for her it got out anyway when he used his hand to fondle the other breast, his index finger and thumb massaging its pink nub and making her start to get hot on the inside.

"Mm...yes, just like that…" she murmured when he switched his tongue over to the right breast after he finished satisfying the left, the sweat on her body from being in the hot spring leaving a salty taste in his mouth.

After she reached a certain point she managed to pry him away from her chest and got him to sit on the edge of pool, and within moments she was on her knees with her head inches away from his erect cock, which she had pulled free from his swimming trunks.

"I'm going to try something new…" said Esdeath as she grabbed her breasts and lifted them up, Tatsumi watching with a grin on his face as she slid his dick in between them and began to move them up and down.

"Does this feel good?" she asked while she tit-fucked him, Tatsumi clenching one of his hands into a fist.

"Y-Yeah, it does." he replied, Esdeath's smile widening before she took it a step further and stuck her tongue out so as to let a trail of her saliva drip off of it and down into her cleavage.

The saliva acted as a lubricant and allowed her to slide her breasts easier around his cock, and when she noticed his expression get even more uncomfortable she giggled and leaned forward.

Tatsumi breathed in sharply when he felt Esdeath's lips clamp down around his head and began to move in synch with her breasts, sucking him off while she continued to tit-fuck him with her large bust. She used her tongue in conjunction with her lips and poked and prodded any chance she got before she pushed down hard and took in half of his length, surpassing her gag reflex so she could keep going without stopping. Her index fingers and thumbs were working on her nipples while she sucked on his dick, bringing her so much pleasure that she was beginning to feel fussy in the brain and her vision was getting blurry.

" _Just a little more…_ " she told herself after glancing back up at Tatsumi, the expression on his face telling her he was nearing his limit.

She quickened her pace and after a few more cycles of bobbing up and down, Tatsumi grunted as he shot his load into her mouth and down her throat. She relished the taste of his semen and when he finished she removed her mouth from around his cock and swallowed it all, licking her lips afterwards to ensure no remnants had been left behind.

"It's been too long since I last got to taste that." she said with lust in her tone, Tatsumi rolling his eyes when she procured her bikini bottom from under the water and threw it over to where she had her top piece.

"Esdeath, you are way too horny for your own good, you know that?" he said while she pulled herself out of the water and situated herself at the pool's edge with her legs spread open, a hand teasing the lips of her wet sex in order to entice him over.

"Yes, I know that. But you wouldn't want to have it any other way, right?"

"Damn straight." he said before walking over to her, grabbing onto her hips and thrusting his dick into her until his pelvis touched skin.

Esdeath moaned at the sudden entry and she gasped when he started to move his hips back and forth at a steady pace, her legs wrapping themselves around him while she intertwined her fingers with his.

Every time he moved his hips Esdeath let out little breaths of air and a tiny whimper, the feeling and experience of having sex after so long causing her to lose all rationality and crave more. She let go of his hands and while he returned them to her hips she rested her left on her stomach and used the other to cup her right breast, playing with it in order to pleasure herself even more.

Tatsumi was enjoying himself as well, but mid-thrust he realized that if Esdeath ended getting pregnant again like before, she would be in danger again. "Hold on, we shouldn't be doing this. What if you get pregnant again?"

"Don't worry. Before we left Straelka I went to doctor and got these special pills. He said that as long as I take one before sexual intercourse, I should be fine." said Esdeath before, all of a sudden, she pushed Tatsumi backwards until he was leaning back against the hot spring's edge, her knees and legs straddling him. "So, instead of saying anything else, let's continue."

She threw her arms around his neck again and brought her hips down so that he could go inside of her again, only this time around she took the lead while Tatsumi just sat still and enjoyed the ride.

"Mm, I love this feeling...your cock inside of me, it's intoxicating!" she moaned as she tightened her inner walls to ensure she felt every single inch. "Suck on my tits again, please…"

Tatsumi obliged and Esdeath threw her head back while gasping when another shock of lightning coursed through her, giving her a slight buzz and giving her new energy to continue on harder and faster. The shock was so powerful that she actually came a little, but it hardly stopped her from picking up the pace again.

Tatsumi could feel the pressure begin to build and, upon reaching its breaking point, he grabbed her hips and thrust his cock as deep as he could into her sex, thick streams of his semen shooting out and coating her inner walls all the way up to her womb. Esdeath's knees wavered a little, but she remained strong and pulled herself off of his stiff member and let out a sigh of relief.

However, she still hungered for pleasure, so she grabbed a towel and spread it out next to the pool's edge while she pulled herself up and out of the water with Tatsumi. He didn't what she was planning on doing until she gently pushed him into his back and crawled over him, only, instead of her face hovering above his it was her soaking wet sex.

"Make me feel good…" she pleaded before she started to suck on his cock again, Tatsumi chuckling to himself at how adventurous his wife was being at the moment.

"What am I going to do with you?" he asked of her before he got to work using his tongue on her folds, Esdeath's eyes widening as shivers ran up and down her spine at the unorthodox feeling.

"Ohh...that...ahhh…" she said after removing her lips from his head for moment to try and comprehend the new experience.

Tatsumi ran the tip of his tongue slowly across her sex once before he actually pushed past her folds, Esdeath letting out a sharp breath when she felt his tongue rub her insides.

Not wanting to let him win, she returned her focus to his stiff member and started to deepthroat him with vigor. It has become a race between the two, and all the while...neither had any clue that a certain pair of eyes were glued on them.

" _I shouldn't be doing this...but I can't stop myself…_ " thought Maya as she peeked out through the cracked open door of the changing room.

She had lost all manual control over her body and was pleasuring herself, with one hand using its fingers to touch and feel her sex, and another having pulled up one side of her bikini top in order to play with the exposed breast. Everything that had happened in the hot spring since she had "left", Maya had seen through the cracked door and, as a result, she couldn't pry herself away from them. Well, one of them, to be specific.

She moaned quietly when she came a little into her fingers, the wet juices sticking to the skin and making a slight squishing sound as she rubbed her folds with the index and middle finger. She pinched her nipple tightly when she spoke a name to herself within her thoughts, and almost instantly her legs gave out from under her and she slid down the wall into her knees.

Back out in the hot spring, Esdeath and Tatsumi were in utter heaven, with both feeling such pleasure they couldn't think proper ally any longer. She had already moved back to the straddling position with his cock inside of her, which she had almost immediately gone too as soon as she gulped down another load of his seed.

Tatsumi had both hands on her thighs and was using his own hips in conjunction with hers to get as deep as possible, and with a final push he came inside her one last time, satisfying the sexual desires that she had been keeping bottled up for so long.

"I've waited...for so long…" said Esdeath out of pure ecstasy while she looked down at her stomach and gingerly touched the skin just above her sex. "I love it when we're connected like this…"

She leaned down and kissed Tatsumi once before her eyes darted upwards and, for a split second, she thought she saw the women's changing room door snap shut. No, she _had_ seen the door close, and after using her incredibly heightened sixth sense she smirked and glanced down at Tatsumi, who raised an eyebrow in confusion.

"What is it?" he asked when Esdeath pulled herself up and sat down next to him with her legs folded underneath her.

"It would seem we weren't the only ones that enjoyed ourselves." she replied before motioning with her head back towards the changing rooms.

It took a few moments for what she said to register with him, but once he realized what she meant Tatsumi rolled over his side and quickly dove back under the water while pulling up his trunks. Esdeath took her time in getting back in the water after organizing her bikini pieces into an organized pile, and when that was all taken care of she submerged herself beside him and stared at the changing room door.

"Maya! I know you're there!" she exclaimed, Tatsumi's gaze going towards the door as they waited for it to open.

When nothing happened in the first few seconds, Esdeath called out for her again, and when it seemed like there really wasn't anyone there and that it was just a trick in her eyes, the door slowly opened and out popped out Maya, who had a heavy blush on her face and her hands were clasped tightly behind her back.

She was averting her eyes and trying hard not to look at them, her awkwardness causing Esdeath to laugh a little.

"Maya, come here." she said, Maya walking towards them and throwing glances at them every so often.

She came to a stop a few inches away from the water's edge and they could both see the glistening spots around the inside of her thighs that they definitely could tell it wasn't sweat, and when she looked up again to see that their eyes were glued on her, her cheeks got even redder.

"Maya, how much did you see?" asked Tatsumi with a slight frown, Maya finally looking him the eyes and toeing the ground with her foot a few times nervously.

"A-All of it…" she murmured in almost a whisper.

"Why?" asked Esdeath calmly.

Maya averted her gaze and began to shift her weight from one foot to the other, her mind racing to try and get the words she wanted to say formulated into a coherent sentence.

"Um…" she started, Tatsumi and Esdeath waiting in silent anticipation to hear what she had to say. "I...I…"

"You…?"

Maya bit her lower lip for a few seconds, but when she finally gathered herself and decided to speak her mind, unafraid of the consequences she closed her eyes and blurted out, "I like you Tatsumi!"

It grew incredibly silent after her proclamation, both Tatsumi and Esdeath staring at her with looks of bafflement painted on their faces. He blinked a few times while trying to register what Maya had said while Esdeath, completely opposite of him, actually grinned and crossed her arms over her chest while keeping her eyes on Maya's.

"So...you like him?" she asked, Maya slowly nodding her head.

Esdeath looked over at Tatsumi with a gleam in her eye, and it only took him a second to recognize it, which caused him to start to shake his head and point at her menacingly. "Esdeath, I know that look. I'm starting to not like that look. Don't even do it."

"How _much_ do you like him?" asked Esdeath, regardless of Tatsumi's protests, and she watched Maya shift her weight to the other foot and avert her eyes again. "Enough to watch him have sex with his wife and masturbate to it behind a closed door?"

If Maya didn't think her cheeks could turn any redder, they sure did after Esdeath hit the nail on the head with what she had been doing, the entire situation getting even more embarrassing for her since Tatsumi was sitting right there next to her. She brought her hands out from behind her back and crossed them over the spot between her thighs, Esdeath giggling a little as she stood up out of the water and walked up next to her, even though she was stark naked.

"You want to have sex with him, don't you."

"Esdeath! What the hell?!" stammered Tatsumi while Maya brought her eyes up to Esdeath's and, with some apprehension at first, slowly nod her head up and down.

"Wait here, I'll be back in a second." said Esdeath before striding off towards the changing room with her discarded bikini pieces in hand, Tatsumi raising a finger up to try and stop her before realizing it was too late and sighing heavily.

" _Oi...that woman, I swear…_ " he thought when Maya stepped down into the pool of water and sat awkwardly with her hands in her lap.

"So...how long?"

"What?" she asked, Tatsumi rubbing the back of his neck while he let out an uneasy breath.

"How long have you, um...liked me?" he inquired again, Maya lowering her gaze and twiddling her thumbs under the water.

"Since...since we fought with our Teigu." replied back Maya, the stiffness in her limbs loosening somewhat. "After watching you go against me with such grievous injuries, saying you would fight against the Empire regardless of what, all just for the sake of making a better place for your daughter to grow up in...I couldn't help but fall for you."

She poked her index fingers together nervously and crossed her legs over under the water. "That's why I would, um, stay the farthest behind in the group. I-I was a little shy."

He turned his head and looked at her and the blush on her face,her words breaking apart the fog over his eyes and allowing him to see Maya in an entirely new perspective. She was similar to Esdeath in that she was strong and very proud of her abilities as a fighter, as shown with their fight prior to the discovery of her real identity. She bravely took on any danger head on and he admired her for that. Yet, on the other hand, he could see how deep the psychological and emotional wounds ran inside of her, the execution of her parents and the sight of their corpses put up on display for all to see being the catalyst that destroyed her innocence. She played it off by saying she was alright, but deep down, the truth of the matter was that she was hurt on the inside, and she was desperate to try and recover what little humanity she had left from the horrible tragedy that had befallen her at such a young age. She had never gotten to know what true friends were outside of Arthur, and she had never experienced what love was.

And out of everyone on the entire planet that could possibly help her...she chose him. With that in mind, he pushed aside his discomfort and prepared himself for what he knew was going to happen next. Aside from her early childhood, with everything that she had experienced from the time her life had all come down around her...she deserved at least one more happy memory.

At that moment Esdeath emerged from the women's changing room with her normal clothes on, a grin on her face, and something in between her fingers.

"Here, eat this." she said as she tossed the small object to Maya, who quickly brought up both hands to catch it.

She opened them up after securing it and saw it was a tiny white pill, her intrigue for the pill rising as she looked up at her with a confused expression.

"What's this for?"

"It's to prevent any "accidents" from happening. It's fast acting too." she replied with a wink, leaving Maya at a loss for words as she briskly turned around and waved at them over her shoulder. "Have fun!"

Esdeath left the hot spring without saying anything else and when the door slammed shut, Maya glanced back at Tatsumi once before she popped the white tablet into her mouth and swallowed it, cringing somewhat at its bitter taste. She waited a couple of minutes to be sure it had done its work, like Esdeath had said, before she inched towards Tatsumi with her blush coming back full-force.

"A-Are you sure you're okay with this…? You don't have to, if you don't want to." she asked nervously with a stutter, which contrasted heavily with the demeanor she had under her Magress persona.

"No...I'm fine. If Esdeath think's it's okay, then so will I." he said at first before he smiled at her. "Plus, you deserve something like this after all the hardships and pain you've had to experience."

Maya lowered her eyes and smiled softly before she reached around to the strings keeping her bikini top up and untied them with one hand, her other arm remaining up in front of her breasts when the piece of clothing broke away.

"O-Okay, just...be gentle." she said before lowering her arm, Tatsumi's eyes widening a fraction of an inch at her sizable bust that rivaled Esdeath's.

Tatsumi sat with his back against the edge of the pool while Maya pulled off her bottom piece, set it to the side with her bikini top, and then hoisted herself up into her knee so that she could straddle him, like how she saw Esdeath do it earlier.

"Stop s-staring so much...it's embarrassing…" she said when she noticed Tatsumi was hyper-focused on her breasts.

"Why? You're beautiful, Maya." he replied back, Maya's blush deepening in volume at his compliment.

With nothing else left to say, Tatsumi brought his hands up to start and fondle her breasts, Maya gasping at the touch of his fingers. He squeezed them softly and the pillow-like flesh morphed around his hands, Maya whimpering at the unorthodox feeling of having her breasts touched and felt by someone else. However, she wasn't against it...in fact, it felt good. *Really good.

Tatsumi started to use his thumb and index finger to rub Maya's tender pink nipples and she gasped, revealing that they were actually quite sensitive to the touch. Rather then rub them harder, he maintained his gentleness and when Maya gave him the okay, he stuck his tongue out and lightly twirled it around one while using his hand on the other.

"Hah...that feels...so good…" she murmured with a lighter tone in her voice as she played with his hair, Tatsumi now sucking on her breast like a newborn baby would with its mother.

" _They're so soft...yet firm at the same time._ "

When both of them were satisfied Maya took a brave step forward and leaned in to steal a kiss from Tatsumi, and contrary to the thought that he wouldn't want it, he not only accepted her affection but gave it back with vigor, the connection their lips had causing her heart to flutter and give off all kinds of warmth. She wasn't the only one when she glanced down upon noticing the hardness of his member underneath her, and she couldn't help but feel happy that she was the one to make him feel this way.

Her mind was now made up. She only wanted him, and no one else. With her heart and mind as one, she got up off of him and crawled over onto the towel Esdeath had laid out on the ground from earlier. Tatsumi followed her and sat down on his knees while Maya lowered herself onto her back and beckoned him over, the look in her eyes telling him she wanted it now.

"I-I want you...I want you to be my first." she said, Tatsumi smiling as he pulled down his trunks and spread her legs out, revealing her sopping wet sex.

"Here I come." he said so she could prepare herself when he pressed the tip of his cock against her entrance.

When he began to push into her she whimpered and gasped harshly at the sudden pain, Tatsumi stopping for fear that he had hurt her. She still managed to smile though and place a hand on his, silently urging him on. He slowly moved his hips forward, more and more of his length going into her until skin touch skin, fully completing their connection.

"Maya, are you okay?" he asked when she cringed again, Maya slowly nodding her head after taking in a deep breath.

"Yes, just wait for a moment please." she asked with a shaky voice.

When her body finally got used to the feeling of his cock inside of her, she motioned for him to continue, albeit slowly, since it was her very first time of having sex.

"Maya, you're so tight…" said Tatsumi as he held onto her curvaceous hips, Maya giggling a little.

"I know you're married to Esdeath, I understand that. But please…" she asked while looking him dead-square in the eyes. "Love me, just this once. That's all I want...someone to love me."

Tatsumi felt his heart ache for her, so he closed his eyes and quick as a flash he maneuvered his hands under her lower back and hoisted her up until he was sitting with his legs sprawled underneath her, Maya's legs around his waist, and their faces just mere inches away from one another.

"I would be happy too." he said softly before kissing her, Maya's eyes shooting wide open for a fraction of a second before she closed them and wrapped her arms around his neck.

She brought her legs back until they were folded up beneath her with her knees at his side before she started to use her hips, his cock sliding in and out of her sex with more speed then before thanks to the feeling of pain from earlier getting replaced with pleasure. Maya let out a moan when their lips disconnected, her mind goingblank as a result of the pleasure coursing through her veins like an intoxicating drug that threatened to take over her entire being.

Even though it felt like they had only just begun, Tatsumi could feel himself reaching his limit, so he whispered into Maya's ear of what was about to happen so that she wouldn't be startled when it eventually came around.

As soon as she pushed down onto his cock he shot his semen into her, coating her inner walls with thick ropes of the stuff and giving Maya such an overwhelming amount of pleasure that she actually orgasmed, squealing a little and slumping forward into Tatsumi's arms. They were both breathing heavily, and after a moment's rest she recovered enough of her strength to lean back and look him in the eye with a look of pure happiness on her face.

"Um...c-could we do that again?" she asked.

"Whatever you want." replied Tatsumi while he ran a hand across one of her ass cheeks, sending shivers running up and down her spine.

She got off of him and laid down on her side, Tatsumi doing the same behind her, and with his left arm propping his upper body up and used the other to lift Maya's leg up by the thigh and enter her again. He thrust in her at a steady pace, Maya letting out little moans of pleasure with every single movement. She twisted her back and they kissed again while Tatsumi let go of her thigh, since she could keep it up herself, and cupped her right breast.

"Y-You really like my breasts..." stuttered Maya when he started to pinch her nipple again, the sensation quickly turning into her favorite.

"They're absolutely perfect, Maya." said Tatsumi before switching over to the other breast.

"Even better then Esdeath's?"

"Hmm...that's a tough one. Let me see."

All of a sudden he squeezed the nipple he was working on harshly, the sharp pain making her squeal with a high-pitched tone. Tatsumi felt her cum while he was still inside of her and he snickered, Maya glaring back at him with a pouty look on her face.

"That wasn't very nice."

"Sorry, I couldn't resist." he apologized while returning to just gently caressing her breasts as he moved in and out of her sex.

"Then...you better make it up...to me, hah…" she asked through several breaths when Tatsumi picked up his pace ever-so-slightly, his climax drawing closer and closer.

When he reached his limit he pushed deep into her once again and Maya moaned in pure ecstasy as more of his semen poured into her inner walls, with some even reaching all the way to her womb. Seeing now that she was satisfied, he slid his cock out of her so that she could roll over to face him.

"Thank you...so much. I'll never be able to repay you." she said, Tatsumi chuckling and giving her that grin of his.

"Don't mention it." he replied before sharing one last kiss with her.

They removed themselves from one another and Maya went to retrieve her borrowed swimsuit from Esdeath while Tatsumi gathered up the towels and returned his swimming trunks to their proper position. A few minutes later they were back up on their floor in the building, with Tatsumi leading Maya to her room and telling her goodbye before leaving to go find the room he and Esdeath shared. Maya watched his back for a second or two before she retreated into her living quarters and closed the door, a hand resting gingerly over her stomach near the spot in between her thighs. She smiled warmly with reddened cheeks at the day's events and laid down to go to sleep, and unlike every other day where it usually took her maybe thirty minutes to an hour to finally fall asleep, she dove into a deep slumber in a matter of minutes and curled up under the covers.

" _Tatsumi...thank you…_ " she had thought one last time before her body totally gave out on her, the waiting arms of sleep taking her away to the land of dreams.

Meanwhile Tatsumi had just plopped down in his bed next to Esdeath, who was staring at him with the biggest grin one could ever imagine possible on her face. He glances at her and rolled his eyes before she asked, "So...?"

"So, what?"

"How was it?

"Why the hell do you want to know?!" stammered Tatsumi with a flustered expression, Esdeath laughing at him.

"I'm curious, is all. I mean, I did just let my *husband have sex with another woman." she explained while he glared intensely at her for a few moments. "I hope you were able to figure out why I let it happen, right?"

Tatsumi nod his head and sighed as he pulled the covers up and over his chest while laying his head back on the pillows

"Yeah. You were letting her experience something other then pain and anger, like she's been forced to her entire life since her parent's execution."

"Yes...just from her eyes alone I could see all of that pain bottled up inside her. She needed something like this to happen in her life at least once, so thank you for doing that." said Esdeath with a low tone in her voice while she crawled over and got in her usual position right next to him on the bed, Tatsumi curling his arm around her shoulders.

"Of course. You should've seen the look on her face. She was probably the happiest she had ever been before that day her life came crashing down." he said with a slight chuckle.

With that they closed their eyes and, within five minutes of doing so, they drifted off to a comfortable slumber that they hadn't gotten the chance to have since going over to Straelka while Esdeath was pregnant with Lucena. They had little to nothing to worry about since they were being watched over by a Danger Beast, a Super-class at that, so instead of getting maybe two, three hours top of actual sleep, it was going to be a full night's rest. It was wonderful.


	35. Opposing Sides

A/N Aaaand that just happened. Fuck to the yeah. Esdeath is a definite keeper is she'll allow that to happen, know what I'm saying? Ahem, joking aside...personally, I feel happy for Maya. She had fulfilled her dream, earning herself position within the Imperial Guard as Budo's Number 2, but because of the Prime Minister, all of that vanished and she was left with nothing other then sadness, despair, pain and untold rage. Like I stated in the previous chapter, the only true friend she's ever had was Arthur, and she never got to experience what it really felt to love someone. So yeah, I know it may come off as "Oh shit, Tatsumi's having sex with two people now, are we entering Harem territory?". No, that's not it at all. To be honest I don't like the idea of stuff like that anyways, but I digress, what I had happen at the end of last chapter was for Maya's sake because out of all the characters in the series so far, I believe she's had one of the most tragic things happen to her, aside from Jacqueline and Camilla of course, the latter having almost the exact same thing happen to her. Tatsumi lost his best friends, Esdeath lost her father and by extension the rest of the Partas Clan, but I'm not counting that considering at that time she was under the different mindset, y'know, "strong live, weak die", Akame and Kurome were sold by their parents and eventually Kurome was tortured and killed, Run found his students killed, Bols felt guilty for killing innocent people, and Leone grew up in the slums. Sure, all of those things are petty sad in their own rights, but what happened to Maya...god damn.

Whew, um, sorry about that rant guys. Needed to get that off my chest. Moving on, the infamous Lieutenant Colonel and the beautiful, and sexy if I do say so myself, Ninja, **Raphael Costner** and **Fiona** , have been added to the impressive cast of characters of **FanFicCollective** as well as the Teigu they utilize, **Ten Thousand Suns: Amaterasu** and **Corpse Swallower: Hræsvelgr** for Rafe and **Lightning Cutter: Kaminari** for Fiona, so head on down my people and check out their appearance. I am especially proud of Rafe's picture because, truth be told, if I were ever to be within the world of Akame ga Kill, I would be him. On another note, there's gonna be someone being introduced in this chapter that some of you guys may have heard of...ever watch Black Bullet anyone? Leave a fav and review my fellow readers.

* * *

 **Chapter 34 - Opposing Sides**

 **\- Surprise and Attack Division Camp, Outskirts of New Kannath -**

 **\- The Next Day -**

Even though the sun was just beginning to peek over the horizon, the Hellraiser commander was already wide awake within his command tent, which was popped up right behind the hulking body of Hræsvelgr, formulating battle plans to finally stamp out the resistance his division's been dealing with upon arriving in the Western Nations. He had his helmet and gas mask off, the two pieces of his outfit resting on the table his tent possessed at which he was standing at, a map of the capital city sitting right next to them. He ran a hand through his fiery red hair and leaned to the side in order to spit out some tobacco infested spit into a bowl on the floor next to his feet, his eyes scanning the map intensely while his tactician's mind raced at over one hundred miles per hour.

" _I know that the resistance has based themselves in the Tyrann Mountains, and I could certainly use Hræsvelgr to flush them out, but it's impossible to know just which mountain they've holed up in._ " he thought with a slight frown as he pressed his finger on the mountains.

" _And if I send my troops to the mountains to weed them out, they'll easily be able to avoid them and find another hole to hide in. Plus, I only have fifty thousand troops, which means if I send them up there then it'll leave the capital and, more importantly, Hræsvelgr with less protection_."

He growled a little at his inability to figure out an effective solution to his problem, and he continued to stare at the map while scratching the slight stubble on his chin until he glanced over his shoulder at Amaterasu, which was resting on his cot above the blankets.

" _Fiona is definitely strong, and with both the Jaegers and Night Raid here as well...it would be dangerous for me to go against them alone._ " he told himself before, slowly, his lips curled up into a devilish smile that seemed to match with his fiery hair. " _But...the essence of battle is what I live for. To fight the strongest of opponents, it makes my blood boil and my heart race!_ "

He had made his decision. He pulled out a combat knife from the pouch he wore on his back right hip and stabbed it into the map, his eyes glued to the Tyrann Mountains.

"I'm coming for you...be prepared!" he proclaimed before snatching his helmet and gas mask, quickly putting them on as he grabbed Amaterasu and left his command tent to begin his mission.

"Sergeant, you're to command the division in my absence. Protect Hræsvelgr at all costs." he said to his second-in-command when he arrived at the camp's outskirts, the officer saluting him his confirmation.

"What of you, sir? What are you planning on doing?"

Rafe chuckled while hoisting his chainsaw onto his shoulder, his gaze cemented in place on the mountain range looming over the valley in the distance. He could see a storm was brewing high up in the sky there, with flashes of lightning being seen every couple of seconds, but what the resistance didn't know was that a storm even more powerful then this one was about to arrive at their doorsteps.

"I'm going to bring an end to this pesky resistance once and for all." he stated before he brought his free hand forth, a spark igniting in the palm of his hand causing it to erupt in black fire. "Come forth, my black steed. The hellish fires of death, destruction and chaos are upon us! Let us make haste!"

As he spoke the ground before him grew dark as a ring of black fire appeared underneath his outstretched hand, a portal opening up to allow a horse made entirely of pitch-black bones consumed by black fire that gave it an appearance of something straight from the lowest depths of hell itself. The ghoulish horse made a neighing noise completely unlike anything ever heard before as Rafe mounted it, the flaming reins transforming his appearance somewhat upon grasping them. A flaming cape formed around his neck and the horse's eyes glowed with demonic energy when it reared back on its hind legs, Rafe laughing like some Warrior King about to set off on his conquest.

"May the flames of war guide me to victory!" he bellowed before speeding off like a bullet, the otherworldly horse faster then anything ever seen before.

A trail of black fire and scorched grass was left in its wake, truly bringing to life his nickname as "Hell's Warden" with his appearance of an undead spirit hunting its next victim.

Indeed, a storm was coming, only instead of thunder and lightning and rain...this would consist of the flames of hell itself that will wash across the very face of the earth and incinerate everything in its path.

 **\- Kaminari's Cave, Tyrann Mountains -**

 **\- 9:00 A.M -**

"Holy shit that was the best sleep I've gotten in months!" exclaimed Lubbock upon entering their floor's living room, Leone yawning heavily as she plopped down onto a couch next to Chelsea.

"I agree with you in that. Not having some psychotic sadist, plant freak or cyborg breathing down our necks certainly helps." said Mine when he walked in, Wave, Akame and Run right behind him.

"Tatsumi and Esdeath are still asleep, I'm guessing?" asked Najenda when she made her appearance.

"I wouldn't blame them. They've done more fighting then probably all of us combined here recently, and against the Empire's strongest no less." said Wave.

"Don't forget about Maya. I swear I thought she was gonna keel over from all of those injuries she sustained during their duel." added on Leone, Wave nodding his head to confirm her statement.

Almost immediately after her name was said, Maya herself emerged from her bedroom and stretched her arms out to get the soreness out from them. Contrary to the normal aloof and emotionless expression they saw her with, she had a smile on her face and seemed brighter then usual.

"Morning."

When she looked at everyone in the living room and saw thee mix of confused and shocked expressions staring right back at her, she raised an eyebrow and crossed her arms while asking, "What's up?"

"Who are you and what have you done with the real Maya Gleipnir?" asked Lubbock with an accusing finger pointed at her, Maya chuckling a little.

"What do you mean?"

"No offense, but, you're usually never this emotional. You're always pretty cold, to be honest." explained Leone.

Maya uncrossed her arms and put one hand on her hip while the other hung at her side, her warm smile turning into a smirk. "Would you rather have me like that over being happy?"

"No that's not what we're saying." interjected Wave before things could get any worse. "All we're saying is that we're not used to seeing you like this."

Maya nod her head and a few seconds later Tatsumi and Esdeath, the last two people to complete the group's attendance, entered the living room still in their sleeping clothes and with tired expressions on their face. Tatsumi yawned and rubbed one of his eyes while Esdeath ran a hand through her hair to flatten some of the bed-head she had.

"I guess someone had a good night's rest." mused Najenda with a grin after they sat down in an unoccupied couch, Esdeath smiling as she rested her head on Tatsumi's shoulder.

"You have no idea…"

The rest of their morning went on similar to this, with the two groups slowly waking up and eating breakfast once Akame and Wave, who turned out to be the best tag-team food making duo they had ever had the pleasure of knowing, got into the kitchen their personal floor in the building. While they were chowing down Arthur made his appearance for the first since since the day before when he left to help out in the cave and its many sub-levels the Western Nations used by the rest of its remaining military.

When Tatsumi and Esdeath had finished getting dressed they were payed a visit by Fiona, who asked for them to come with her to meet with some very important people. They travelled down the stairs to the bottom floor of the large tower complex, arriving at a pair of doors heavily guarded by some Dragoons.

"Welcome back Captain. The Chairman and the General are waiting for you inside." said one of the armored soldiers as they stepped aside, Fiona motioning for Tatsumi and Esdeath to follow her.

"Wait, General? I thought all of the Western Nation's top military officials were executed." questioned Esdeath when they approached the door.

"General Hiruko's the only one left alive. And it's a good thing too, because he's a tactical genius. He was the one that allowed our armies to gain so many victories over the Empire. He's also really strong too, he possesses one of the lost Teigu, so no one ever sees it coming and hardly has any idea what it can do. He is a little overconfident though."

She pushed open the doors and allowed them to enter first, Tatsumi and Esdeath immediately seeing the room comprised of a single desk with one person sitting behind it, and the second person standing over off in the other part of the room with his arms crossed. He got chills up his spine after making eye contact with the second man because of his attire, which consisted of a maroon suit with plant-like designs on the collars, a rose and handkerchief sticking out of it's left breast pocket, dark purple dress pants, dress shoes, and completing the appearance was a magician's hat resting atop his slicked-back grey hair.

It was like a different incarnation of the Inquisitor, only instead of a glasgow smile staring back at him, the man's entire face was hidden behind a white porcelain mask decorated with a mischievous smile running from cheekbone to cheekbone, and giving him visibility were two crescent moon-shaped eyeholes flowing downward.

The man sitting behind the desk however was a little more welcoming, with a warm smile and a cheery air around him. He was dressed in a suit as well, only wrapped around his left arm was an orange band that signified his position within the Western Nations' government as the Chairman.

"Mr. Chairman, General Hiruko, sir. Here are Tatsumi and Esdeath, like you requested." said Fiona with a bow to the first man and a salute to the second, the Chairman getting up out of his seat in order to shake their hands.

"Welcome, it's a pleasure to have you here. We've been needling a lot of help here lately, and with the Jaegers and Night Raid here, this will definitely allow us to retake our nation back from the Empire."

"The pleasure is ours, Mr. Chairman." said Tatsumi with a smile before his gaze drifted over to General Hiruko, who now began walking towards him silently.

When he got close enough Esdeath noticed that peering out from the eyeholes of his mask were small yellow eyes with white irides, and just from his posture alone he emanated a feeling of superiority and humbleness, since he was in the presence of the former most formidable General the Empire ever produced.

"Greetings, Tatsumi, General Esdeath. My name is Kagetane Hiruko." he said as he extended his gloved hand out to Tatsumi first, the Jaeger shaking it.

"It's former General, now. But thank you for the formality." replied Esdeath with a grin after she shook the General's hand, Kagetane chuckling lightly as he drew back his hands to hold them behind his back.

'"So, I hear that you and Fiona were able to catch a glimpse of the weapon that the Empire is using to keep our cities held hostage?" asked the Chairman as he offered them a seat in the two chairs situated before his desk, Kagetane walking around to stand next him while Fiona remained close to the door.

Tatsumi nod his head and rested his hands in his lap while letting out a heavy sigh. "Yeah. It's a massive siege artillery-type Teigu named Corpse Swallower: Hræsvelgr. And we also got to see for ourselves the commander of the Imperial Military division occupying the capital."

"The Hell's Warden?! You fought him?" asked Kagetane with a surprised tone.

"His full name is Raphael Costner, a Lieutenant Colonel who among the Imperial Military was nicknamed the Supreme Soldier for his various accomplishments on the battlefield. Before I left the Empire, my army was the strongest, and following behind was the Surprise and Attack Division, otherwise known as the Hellraisers, led by the Lieutenant Colonel." explained Esdeath to give them some background information on their enemy while she crossed her legs over. "If I hadn't been a General in the Empire, I have no doubt that he would've gotten my nickname of "Empire's Strongest General"."

"He's that strong?" asked the Chairman, who paled when both of them nodded with a grim expression.

"Fiona, did you get a chance to see if he owns a Teigu?"

"Yes, sir. It's a long chainsaw blade that can create black fire at will, and he's highly proficient at using it." said Fiona to answer Kagetane's question.

"Dammit...seems our situation's worse then we thought." growled the General when he left the Chairman's side in order to pace around and think of a strategy.

"The only real threat to the Western Nations, to be honest, is the Lieutenant Colonel. With Hræsvelgr being so large and cumbersome, if we attack it en-masse after taking out Rapheal it would easily fall because it won't be able to defend itself properly or retreat." informed Esdeath, the Chairman looking over at Kagetane when he stopped himself mid-stride.

The oplan could definitely work, they have twice the manpower the Hellraisers possess and, if the Lieutenant Colonel is taken care of, then that will leave just his men left. And considering they have the rest of the Jaegers and Night Raid with them they should easily fall in battle, securing a victory and their nation so that they could begin making plans to strike back at the Empire for what they've done.

"Well...I don't see any problem with that."

All of a sudden they all felt a wave of malicious and powerful intent wash over the room and phase through their bodies, Tatsumi and Fiona recognizing it almost immediately as someone they never thought they would see so soon. One look from Kagetane and the Chairman at them told the entire story for them, and without a word they left the room and told the guards outside what was about to happen.

"Tatsumi, Esdeath, you and your friends go with the Chairman and help evacuate the troops with Kaminari." said Fiona as she gripped her Teigu tightly, Kagetane adjusting his right hand's glove.

"What? It will be easier to take him on and anyone else he brought with us." rebuked Esdeath with a frown, the General glancing back at her with that mischievous smile on his mask and chuckling.

"You've all been fighting for who knows how long, so you deserve a break."

"And besides, this bastard is on our turf. It's time we got some revenge." snarled Fiona, her anger causing tiny volts of lightning to lance out across her skin.

Unable to change their minds, Tatsumi and Esdeath agreed and quickly left their side to round up their friends and get out with the remaining soldiers the Western nation possessed, the CHairman and his guards going with them. Meanwhile Kagetane and Fiona took the most direct path to the outside and upon emerging from the building, they prepared themselves for the person they could both see approaching the mouth of the cave slowly. He was on a black, flaming horse, and his physique was hidden entirely behind a flaming cloak and hood, but they both knew exactly who the figure was.

"So that's the Lieutenant Colonel...he really does fit the moniker of "Hell's Warden." murmured Kagetane while he removed his gloves and stuffed them into his pocket, revealing he wore a porcelain ring with a strange symbol inscribed onto it around his right pinkie finger.

"Be careful with him. He's tricky." replied back Fiona in a whisper, the General glancing at her and chuckling.

"Wow...here I am being told by a subordinate of mine to be careful. Don't you think I know that?"

Fiona smirked and looked him in the eye, the eye she promised Kaminari she would always close before a battle took place snapping shut. "Got to keep an eye out for you Gramps. Now come on, let's waste this guy."

"I couldn't agree with you more."

They waited in silence side by side, their eyes glued on the approaching Lieutenant Colonel who melted away any stray snowflakes that happened to drift by his flaming cloak into nothingness. He glared at them from underneath his hood, and after walking underneath the maw of the cave he reached up and pulled it back while his hellish horse came to a stop and padded its hoof against the rocky floor.

"Ah...so this is where you've been hiding." remarked Rafe with a chuckle as he hopped off of his horse, the flaming cloak and animal almost instantly diverging out into an inferno that vanished almost as quickly as it appeared. "I must say it was quite ingenious."

"I'm guessing you're the Lieutenant Colonel known as Hell's Warden?" asked Kagetane after bringing up his right hand, palm facing outwards, while Fiona kept a hand tightly wrapped around Kaminari's hilt.

"Indeed, that is I. But, I didn't come here to talk...I came here to fight."

"Shouldn't you have come here with your men?" questioned Kagetane, who was wondering why the head of the snake strangling the Western Nations would show up alone and without backup.

"Allow me to let you in on a little secret. The Empire, Prime Minister and Great General? I don't hold any loyalty to _any_ of them. In fact, I detest the Prime Minister with a burning passion in my soul. He's a weak, spineless coward who's a waste of space and deserves to be killed for all of the heinous crimes he's committed. Out of all the officers in the Imperial Military, it was only the late Great General Budo and I who could not be swayed by his vile tongue." snarled Rafe with an obvious amount of hate in his tone of voice, which surprised Fiona and Kagetane greatly.

There was another officer of the Empire that despised the Prime Minister? What was even more surprising was that the deceased Great General Budo himself hated the corrupt politician, which just proved even further that the man was as evil and soulless as the rumors about him spoke of.

"Then...who do your loyalties lie with?" asked Kagetane in a low tone, Fiona remaining silent.

"They lie with my men. They are my brothers in arms, and I consider them my own flesh and blood. I'd die for my men, and they would do the same for me. That is one of the reasons why I came here alone...I don't want to see any more of them die for a fruitless cause."

"And the other reason…?"

Rafe looked at them for a few moment before he began to laugh, the air in the cavern beginning to pick up as a ring a black fire appeared around the Lieutenant Colonel. Kagetane and Fiona steeled themselves against the overwhelming power he was emitting, their nerves tensing up in anticipation.

"My other desire...is nothing else but to fight to strongest of opponents! I relish the thrill of battle, the adrenaline rush! Watching my enemies burn at my feet...it's exhilarating!" he declared at the top of his lungs while the flames around him continued to roar and flare. "So show me your strength! I want you to entertain me!"

Kagetane let out a deep sigh and released all of the built up tension and stress within his body, his mind becoming perfectly clear. He fixed his gaze on the Lieutenant Colonel and stated blankly, "With pleasure."

"Thunder Wave!" bellowed Fiona as she simultaneously supercharged Kaminari and drew the blade in a flash, unleashing a storm of lightning that swept across the ground and struck Rafe dead in the center of his chest.

However, instead of dropping to the ground like she had expected him to, he merely shrugged off the attack and chuckled at them. He looked down at his chest and noticed that his breathing apparatus and its related devices had been scorched by the lightning, rendering them useless, so while Kagetane and Fiona watched he removed his bowl helmet and proceeded to unclasp the gas mask from around his face. Several hisses of trapped air emerged from behind the contraption before Rafe fully removed it and tossed aside, revealing to them the face of Hell's Warden.

To be honest, it wasn't quite what they were expecting. Instead of a tough, grizzled and battle-scarred commander, Rafe was actually quite handsome. His fiery red hair stood out the most among all of his other traits, and within his greenish-blue eyes they could see the flames of a warmonger raging on with nothing to stop them. He had a slight stubble on his chin, and an obvious lump in his lower lip meant he chewed tobacco, which was the first time Fiona had seen someone do that.

"How did you…?" she started to ask before Rafe pointed to the coat he wore and grinned, revealing that contrary to his exterior appearance he had given himself a more shark-like look by filing his teeth to razor-sharp points.

"I took every extra measure I could when designing the uniforms my soldiers and I wear. This coat is fireproof, waterproof and acid proof. I also took the liberty of threading rubber strands through my own clothes so that I could withstand lightning attacks such as yours. The fatigue uniform I also wear underneath this possesses a separate layer between the fabric that contains a material that, after receiving a sudden influx of pressure from things such as punches or kicks, the material will instantly harden and act as a cushion and protect me from having any of my bones broken...like what I know your Teigu is capable of." he explained with a glare at Kagetane and the ring he wore,

"You know of my Teigu?!" stammered Kagetane in shock.

"Most definitely. Thanks to the Teigu Log Book, which I studied extensively, I know every single Teigu that the Empire constructed upon its founding. It's name is Path of Divinity: Kami, and it's user is granted the ability to manipulate repulsive forces at will, and Fiona's Teigu is Lightning Cutter: Kaminari. Both are exceptionally lethal...which only gets me even more excited!"

In an instant Rafe lifted Amaterasu off of his shoulder and swept it to the side, the flames dancing around him twirling around its blade when he pressed down on the trigger to start the chain's rotation.

"Will O' Wisp!" he bellowed when seven flaming spheres materialized in the air and rushed Kagetane and Fiona.

Fiona dove to the side and cursed under her breath when three of the spheres changed direction in the blink of an eye in order to pursue her, while Kagetane smirked behind his mask and focused his gaze on the approaching projectiles.

"Suppress."

Rafe's eyes narrowed when his technique was suddenly pushed back for a great distance by some invisible force that used Kagetane as its origin, and in that split second he analyzed his enemy's entire body posture and stance in order to determine the best strategy against him. He brought the pushed back fire spheres back around and directed them at Kagetane again, only instead of having all four shoot right at him again...Rafe changed it up a little.

"Attacks like this are useless against me." stated Kagetane before he noticed the evil grin on Rafe's face, and instantly a bad feeling emerged in the pit of his stomach.

Quicker then he could react all four spheres changed direction and rocketed into the down a couple of feet in front of him, exploding and sending a plume of rock dust out in all directions. With his vision impaired, Kagetane used his sixth sense to try and get a feel for his surroundings until the dust and smoke settled.

Unfortunately, he didn't have that luxury. Suddenly Rafe slammed his open palm onto his face and pushed him back to smash his body into the ground, a spiderweb of cracks lancing out from under him upon impact.

"General!" exclaimed Fiona when she saw Rafe slam his foot into the side of Kagetane's head with a vicious kick, knocking him out cold.

"Now...it's just you, Fiona." he said with a slight grin as he revved Amaterasu again, the chains spinning around the saw blade making an ear-killing shrill.

Fiona clenched her jaw muscles and created a shadow clone that took the fireballs for her, the explosion lightning up her back as she flew at Rafe with her eyes blazing with unrivaled fury. The Lieutenant Colonel laughed and met her head on, their blades clanging against one another as they went against one another in a battle of wits and swordsmanship. Fiona ducked away when Rafe lunged at her head with Amaterasu, a glint appearing in her eye when she activated her Trump Card and created six shadow clones.

In an instant she turned the tables on the Lieutenant Colonel, assaulting him with a barrage of sword swipes and stabs that cut through his clothing and reached his skin. She landed a kick that propelled him back a few feet and, wanting to bring a swift end to this fight here and now, she rushed him with her hand tightly gripping the hilt of Kaminari as lightning danced around her body and made her hair stand on end.

"Ultimate Art…"

"It's not gonna be that easy! Temperature Rise!" bellowed Rafe, Fiona's eyes widening in shock when an excruciatingly painful wave of heat emerged from him and washed over her body.

It felt like she had just been thrown into a raging inferno, and in her shock Rafe had plenty of time to grab her tightly by the throat, lift her into the air and toss her out through the cave opening to the snow covered pathway outside while he dispatched of her shadow clones.

Fiona could still feel the tingly sensation in her skin from the heat wave Rafe had given off, but with the heavy winds and snow it carried raging on outside the mountain she quickly cooled down and, to avoid possibility of frostbite she kept a steady current of electricity running through her veins to keep her body stimulated.

She narrowed her eyes and watched as Rafe killed the last of her shadow clones and turned to face her, his grin still present. "Ingenious use of your Shadow Clones Fiona. It was a wonderful strategy."

"Thanks…" she murmured as he followed her flight path out of the cave, his boots sinking down into the snow at least half a foot.

" _All I have to do is keep him distracted long enough for Kaminari to transport everyone to the city so that they can take over Hræsvelgr._ " she thought while wiping the snow from her body and placing her hand on her Teigu's hilt again, the Lieutenant Colonel eyeing her every move.

"I know why you're doing this, by the way. You're buying time for your allies to capture Hræsvelgr from my men, right? Fiona?"

Fiona hid her surprise behind a cold expression, but unfortunately for her Rafe could see right through it, and with a slight chuckle he placed a hand on his hip. "Don't worry about them, I've ordered my men to shoot to wound, not kill."

"Why do you keep doing things like that? We're on opposing sides, and I know that you've killed so many people…" she asked of the infamous Hellraiser commander.

"You already know why."

"Then _why_ can't you just defect?!" demanded Fiona with a shaky tony in her voice, Rafe jumping a little at how the conversation quickly escalated. "You've seen for yourself that the Empire is losing against the Eastern Nation, and now that the Jaegers and Night Raid are here, the Western Nations will be liberated too! It's pointless to keep fighting for them!"

Rafe lowered his gaze and the fingers around Amaterasu slackened their grip, the Teigu's spinning chains slowing to a crawl now that the trigger had been released. She was right, you were ignorant if you couldn't see that the Empire's forces were losing ground *fast. It was only a matter of time now before the Imperial Capital itself was put under siege, and he would be lying to himself if he said he hadn't thought of cutting his losses and defecting from the Imperial Military along with his army to join the revolution.

"Fiona...you know I can't just do that. I am a soldier, I cannot abandon my men."

"But you abandoned me." said Fiona with traces of tears in her eyes, Rafe's heart tightening up at the look she gave him. "We were supposed to be married…"

Rafe clenched his hands and growled under his breath, the truth being shoved in his face overwhelming in his defenses and battling his devotion and loyalty to the Empire as one of its soldiers. Unfortunately for the Empire, just like he had stated earlier, he truly held no ties to the Prime Minister and despised the corrupt politician with every fiber of his being, and for the Empire he hardly cared for it at all. His loyalty remained only with the men who had fought and bled alongside him on the field of battle, but before them...there was only one person who deserved that.

What happened next caught Fiona completely off guard. Rafe stabbed Amaterasu into the snow and trudged forward, the body heat he could generate as a result of being its user melting his path for him, until he reached Fiona. He reached down to grab her hand and gently pulls her up until her eyes were level with his, the casual grin she had grown to like about him from when she first met him appearing.

"Okay...I'll be back. And when I do return, I'll ask of one more favor." he said when his hellish steed returned to life a couple of feet behind them.

"What are you going to do?" asked Fiona as he mounted the horse and maneuvered it over to where Amaterasu was protruding out of the snow in order to retrieve it.

"Why don't you come with me and find out?" he replied when he held out a hand down to her upon trotting over to her, Fiona looking at the hand and then back at him.

After a moment of doubt she let go of Kaminari and slipped her hand into his, the Lieutenant Colonel pulling her up onto the horse to sit behind him. To her surprise the flames the creature was comprised off gave off no heat whatsoever, even though its bones were clearly made up of the black fire Amaterasu was blessed with.

After he went to pick up the still comatose Kagetane and Fiona laid him out sideways across its back, Rafe snapped the reins to get the horse sprinting off down the path from Kaminari's cave to the city in the distance, which even from here they could see several smoke columns different from the usual ones from the city rising up just beyond the outskirts.

"Are you sure we'll be able to make it in time?" asked Fiona as they flew past steep cliffs through the raging mountain winds, Rafe laughing at her doubt.

"Just watch me!" he bellowed before he glanced back at her and winked. "And you might want to hold on."

Fiona wrapped her arms around his waist and he looked back towards where the horse was facing, his fingers pressing down on the trigger to start revving Amaterasu's chain and create more of its signature black fire. Suddenly a few meters in front of them a circular portal that was made entirely out of the fire came into existence, its center making a rippling effect that gave it the look of water even though it wasn't even close to being liquid.

"Authority of the Gods!" he yelled, the portal instantly opening up and giving a picture perfect image of the Hellraiser camp, Fiona bracing herself as Rafe sped the horse up.

With a burst of fire they leaped out through a second portal that had appeared at the top of the hill overlooking the camp and came to a screeching halt, the Lieutenant Colonel yelling at the top of his lungs the order for not only his own men, but for anyone within earshot the stop what they were doing immediately.

"Fiona?!" stammered Tatsumi when he saw the pair gallop down the hill atop Rafe's horse and come to a screeching halt, the appearance of them together sending confusion raging like wildfire through both the Hellraisers and the Western Nations' soldiers.

"Stand down!" ordered Rafe with authority in his tone, the Hellraisers immediately lowering their weapons and standing at attention.

"Could someone please explain to me what the hell is going on?" asked Lubbock when the soldier he was about to fight stepped back, Fiona turning around to face them while Rafe approached his men with Amaterasu at his side.

"Just wait and see." she said with a grin after pulling down her face mask so that it could hang around her neck.

"Men, there's been a change of plans." started Rafe while he paced left and right in front of his soldiers. "Our original mission is null and void, we have a new objective now."

The men of the Surprise and Attack Division stood rigidly still with their eyes glued on their commander, the Lieutenant Colonel coming to a halt and facing them with a stoic expression.

"Men, I'm sure that you all can see that the Empire has entered a state of decline, which has resulted in the beginning of the revolution we have fought against for a while now. With the introduction of the Eastern Nation as a new enemy, and seeing as how we are outnumbered here...I've made a decision. I will be defecting from the Imperial Military and join the Western Nations army." announced Rafe for all to hear, the jaws of Tatsumi, Esdeath, the Jaegers and all of Night Raid dropping to the ground out of sheer surprise. "If you do not agree with this, then you may return to the Imperial Capital now. I won't stop you. The choice is up to you."

Rafe stood silently with his eyes sweeping from one end of the assembled Hellraisers division to the other, the soldiers glancing at one another a few times before Rafe's second in command stepped forward as the voice for them all.

"Sir, I think I speak for all of us when I say that we won't be leaving any time soon. Just as you said, we're brothers in arms whom have bled at each other's side through thick and thin. We're not going to abandon you sir, just like you haven't abandoned us."

Tatsumi couldn't help but grin as he and Esdeath watched Rafe shake hands with the man and bring an end to the announcement, the Hellraisers lowering their weapons and greeting their new found allies with open arms.

"Well, Fiona, I never would've expected to see this coming."

Fiona whirled around and watched Kagetane, who had only just now woken up from the comatose state Rafe had put him in earlier, walk over to her with his hands held behind his back. At first she was scared considering the Lieutenant Colonel had brutally knocked him out, but instead of what she expected to happen, the General approached the Hellraiser commander and offered a hand to the man when he turned around from ordering his men to pick up the camp.

"It's a pleasure to have you, Lieutenant Colonel."

"The pleasure is all mine, General. And sorry about knocking you out" replied Rafe with a grin after shaking the man's hand firmly, solidifying their new bond as allies and not enemies.

He turned to Fiona and hoisted Amaterasu over his shoulder again while calling over his flaming steed, which had been standing off on the side without moving ever since they had first arrived back at the camp.

"Fiona, I'll be leaving for a short while. I may be defecting, but as a soldier it is my duty to inform my commanding officer and the Emperor of the fate of my men and the situation in the Western Nations."

"No, don't leave! Who cares about that?" she pleaded, but before she could continue Rafe grinned again.

"However, nothing's stopping me from *lying about what happened here. For all they know...I was the only survivor, and that before escaping with my life I managed to severely injure some of you guys." he replied mischievously before making quick glances at Night Raid and the Jaegers.

"You would do that?" asked Najenda of the Lieutenant Colonel.

"Indeed. Now, if you'll excuse me…" started Rafe before he created a portal of fire just like the one he had used to transport himself and Fiona. "I have to fulfill my final duty as a soldier of the Imperial Military."


	36. The Warden and the Dragon

A/N It's all coming together...the Kingdom of Straelka pushing from the east, and soon the Western Nations will once again begin their push from the west alongside the Revolutionary Army and Path of Peace from the south. However there's still a LOT of story left, so don't get your hopes up just yet…khehehe. Leave a fav and I SURE AS HELL KNOW THERE ARE MORE THEN 2-3 people out there that read this story. Don't be shy! Leave a review telling me what you think my readers, I'm very interested to see what you like and other things. Do it or I'll have Kahfka hunt you down, and we all know that's a BAD idea.

* * *

 **Chapter 35 - The Warden and the Dragon**

The familiar rush of air that came with transporting from one place to the other assaulted Rafe's ears as he emerged on his horse a few miles away from the gates of the Imperial Capital, his gaze set upon the glistening palace towering up above the rest of the city.

He kicked the sides of his hellish steed and it walked forward, the soldiers guarding the gate immediately letting him in once they recognized him as the infamous Hell's Warden. It didn't take long for him to make his way to the palace considering anyone who saw him immediately moved out of the way to avoid touching his horse.

The reactions of the Imperial Guards at the palace gates were the same as the people, the men instantly letting him pass when they recognized him. The entire capital had heard of his infamous reputation, which had earned him a spot in the history books as one of the strongest soldiers ever produced alongside Esdeath, the late GReat General Budo, and others. He held great pride in this and his nickname as "The Supreme Soldier", but as he dismounted his horse and strode up to the doors of the Imperial Palace, he realized that by deserting from the Empire...he would lose all of it. His reputation would be in tatters, and he would be proclaimed a traitor that would be killed on sight.

" _Remember why you're doing this._ " he told himself after passing by the silent Faceless guarding the entrance.

He could remember that day like it was yesterday...the day he had proposed to Fiona. Back then he was still a soldier if the Empire, only he had yet to gain the position as Lieutenant Colonel, and she had yet to become a part of the Western Nations military. She had just gotten done training with that dragon up in the mountains, and the look on her face after he got down on a knee in order to ask of her the question every woman dreams of hearing, well, the only word he could use to describe it was priceless.

But, like fate wanted to deny them both of their special day, he was called back to the Empire to become the commander of the Surprise and Attack Division and lead them on a campaign to subjugate the Northwestern Territories. Since then, they hadn't seen one another up until now...and hearing from just how torn up she was inside about his departure...it overruled his soldier's pride and dedication to the Empire.

He entered the white marble hallway leading to the throne room doors and inhaled deeply, readying himself for those he knew were just beyond those doors. "Here goes nothing."

Rare knocked once on the doors, and a few seconds later they were opened from within by another pair of Faceless to allow him entry. The first person he saw upon stepping into the throne room was the Emperor himself, and standing right beside him was of course the Prime Minister. He looked to his left and stared directly into gaze of the Great General herself, the woman who had led to the swift downfall of the Empire's enemies all at once.

This was the first time Rafe was seeing her, and to be quite honest, he couldn't really see how she was the most feared among all off the Empire's forces. She was quite beautiful, and her eyes were perplexing in a way due to their strange appearance and the *heterochromia she possessed.

"Lieutenant Colonel? What are you doing here?" asked Jacqueline with a look of utter confusion on her face, Rafe glancing at her and growling.

"Allow me to inform you, Great General." he replied before fixating his gaze on the Emperor and bowed to show his respect. "Unfortunately, I bring bad news, your Highness."

"You may proceed." said Honest with a carefree smile, which made Rafe throw up a little in his mouth.

"The Jaegers and Night Raid were able to successfully rally the remaining forces of the Western Nations military and suppress my forces to the point of destruction. I was able to severely wound and kill some of the enemy before escaping, however, and thanks to some of my techniques I was able to avoid serious injury myself." stated Rafe with a monotone voice, the grin on Jacqueline's face soon fading away along with the Prime Minister's.

"Who did you kill?" asked Jacqueline eagerly, Rafe crossing his arms over his chest and huffing.

"The last surviving General of the Western Nations, and two members of Night Raid alongside a Jaeger with blonde hair. That was all I was able to do, Great General."

Jacqueline's cocky grin returned upon learning of the deaths of some of her enemies, and it was this time that Rafe decided to really ruin her day. He cleared his throat to recapture their attention and held his hands behind his back, the Prime Minister raising an eyebrow in anticipation.

"I also have something else to say. Sorry Prime Minister, Great General, your Highness, but after seeing how our enemies have beaten back our forces against all odds, I've determined that the flames of this Empire are close to being put out, and personally...I want to be on the _winning_ side."

Rafe couldn't help but laugh on the inside at how quickly the expressions of all three of them changed with his statement, especially Jacqueline. Her eyes widened in shock and he thought he saw a slight twitch from her left eye, which only made the feeling that much more enjoyable.

"W-What did you just say?" she asked with a stutter, Rafe looking at her with a wolfish grin before turning to walk back towards the throne room doors.

"You heard me. I'm leaving the Empire. Simple as that."

"If you walk out through that door, you will be a traitor to the Empire, and I will personally torture you to the point you'll be begging me to kill you." snarled Jacqueline in a low tone while also giving off a fraction of her killer intent.

Rafe stopped his outstretched hand an inch away from the door handle and froze up, the Great General, the Emperor, and Honest all staring at him intensely. He slowly turned his head around and glared at Jacqueline with one eye, his grin completely gone and replaced with a dark scowl.

"Walk out through this door...and I'll be considered your enemy, huh?" he asked before, all of a sudden, he let loose such a huge amount of killer intent and power it utterly blew away the two Faceless on either side of him and actually pushed back Jacqueline several feet. "Do you _really_ think that scares me!?"

A small ring of black fire had now appeared at the feet of the Lieutenant Colonel, Jacqueline gritting her teeth and bracing herself against his power. She knew that Rafe was strong, he wouldn't have earned himself the position as commander of the Surprise and Attack Division as well as the nicknames "Hell's Warden" and "Supreme Soldier" if he wasn't, but what she was feeling right now was something beyond her expectations. His strength was almost on the same level as Esdeath when she fights seriously, and now that she was seeing it firsthand...she couldn't help but get excited at the idea of fighting him herself.

"I have obtained a multitude of injuries, both minor and life-threatening, during the course of my tenure as the Hellraiser's commander, and through those ordeals I have learned to ignore the feeling of pain." proclaimed Rafe with authority in his voice while pointing directly Jacqueline. "Know this, Great General, I won't be so easy to kill. Get too close to me...and I'll _burn_ that pretty little face of yours."

Jacqueline growled as Rafe exited the throne room and, not wanting to let him escape, she sprinted after him with a bone rod already protruding out of her hand and threw open the doors. The Lieutenant Colonel, however, was already gone, the only sign of his departure being the black flame portal that vanished a split second after she entered the marble chamber.

" _Oh well, it's not a total loss…_ " thought Jacqueline when she withdrew her blade back into her arm. " _Kahfka...make them pay._ "

 **\- New Kannath -**

The people of the Western Nations, upon learning of the defection of the Hell's Warden and the Hellraisers from the Imperial Military, let out a collective sigh of relief now that they didn't have to worry about the threat Hræsvelgr posed to their cities. Kaminari, once he felt that the state of the people he had come to love and watch over as the benevolent and peace-loving being had returned to normal, departed from the capital with a round of goodbyes to his new friends.

"Now that the Western Nations have been freed from the Empire's control, what's our next step?" asked Run when the Jaegers met with Night Raid, the Chairman and Kagetane.

"For starters we need to get a message to our friend, the Princess of Straelka, who's leading her army from the east towards the capital, informing her of the situation here." said Esdeath as she crossed her arms and sat back in her seat next to Tatsumi.

"We'll also have to get a message to the Revolutionary Army as well. After that, we coordinate a plan to push on the capital from three fronts just like before." added in Najenda with a glance at Kagetane and the Chairman.

"We'll send out messengers at once. In the meantime, you can stay here in the capital until you all have to leave, if you have to." replied the Chairman while Kagetane stood up and excused himself to carry out his orders.

Not even a second passed by from the General leaving the room when the door was flung open again and the spy from earlier poked his head in, a huge smile on his face.

"The Lieutenant Colonel just got back from the capital, and, well, things are getting interesting outside."

Tatsumi and Esdeath looked at one another in confusion before they stood up with Wave, Run and Chelsea to go see for themselves what the spy meant by "interesting".

"This sounds like fun, anyone else want to come with?" asked Leone while stretching her arms.

After her question, Akame and Maya were the only ones that decided to go with her since Najenda was going to stay and help the Chairman and other surviving political figures, with Arthur assisting her, Lubbock was going to create a web of threads around the perimeter of the Parliament building with Cross Tail, and Mine was going to spend some time cleaning and giving Pumpkin some maintenance.

They were able to catch up with Tatsumi, Esdeath and the others as they left the Parliament Building and quickly made their way to the outskirts of New Kannath, catching a glimpse of two figures standing just a few meters away from the farthest building.

"There they are, it's Fiona and Rafe." said Wave with the pointing of a finger, the large group coming to a halt a couple of meters away.

Fiona noticed them and gave them all a wave while Rafe saluted them, typical of his soldier-like attitude and appearance, before returning his attention to Fiona and grinning when they joined in on their conversation.

"So how was it?" asked Leone, Rafe chuckling a little.

"I have to say, it was one of the more enjoyable things I've done outside of battle. The look on the Prime Minister's face was priceless." he replied, the lioness smirking at the small victory of ruining the fat politician's day.

"What about Jacqueline? How did she react?"

"Hehe, it was about the same, but you should've heard what she said."

Rafe went through the entire meeting with Jacqueline and the Prime Minister, and when he got to the part about him being told by the Great General he would be tortured by the sadist if he walked out through the throne room doors, they all got a kick at how he responded to her. Hearing of their enemy's displeasure with one of their top soldiers openly deserting before them and the Emperor himself definitely brought smiles to their faces.

"But...now that I'm here for good, there's just one last thing I need to know." asked Rafe as he focused directly on Fiona, who's smile wavered somewhat.

"What is it?" she asked, Rafe's grin widening.

He pointed to her sword hanging from her waist and looked into her eyes, "We never really found out which of us was the stronger fighter. What do you say, Fiona? Want to finally answer that question once and for all?"

Fiona, after registering what he had asked of, rolled her eyes and let out a heavy sigh while she placed a hand on Kaminari's hilt. "Really?"

"Yeah, and of course it's not gonna be to the death. Let's just keep it simple and use our strongest techniques. Whomever is still standing after the dust settles is declared the winner. Does that sound acceptable?" said Rafe with an eyebrow cocked upwards.

"If it will finally satisfy some desire of yours, then yes. And are we gonna have to hold back or..?"

Rafe had already begun walking in reverse with a grin still plastered on his face in the middle of her question, and just from his posture and expression she could already guess what his answer was going to be. When he was a good distance away he crossed his arms over his chest and chuckled, a slight breeze blowing across the ground in between the two.

"No limits whatsoever. We can go all out." he said before running a hand through his hair nervously laughing. "Just try not to kill me."

"Same goes to you."

Tatsumi and Esdeath retreated from the immediate area with the other spectators, and as an extra precautionary Chelsea was at the ready with the satchel full of Solomon's Phoenix blood. In the course of leaving Solomon and Camilla they had barely made a dent in the supply of the Jaeger's miracle blood, so in case the fight between Rafe and Fiona got a little too carried away and one of them did get seriously injured, they could be healed almost instantaneously.

"Now...before we begin...there's something you need to know about my Teigu. You see, that long chainsaw you've seen me primarily use...that is not the true form of Amaterasu."

"It isn't?" asked Fiona warily as Rafe brought both of his hands up and dropped his grin. "Then what is it exactly?"

"Amaterasu is the black fire I control itself, a flame so enormously hot and powerful it can literally eat away anything it touches...even other flames." the Lieutenant Colonel explained while summoning several orbs of black fire that floated behind him in a circle with one in the center. "To claim this Teigu, I had to endure the pain of its flame for seven days and nights until it finally extinguished itself. Thanks to a certain alchemist I was able to regain the flesh I had lost to Amaterasu, but as a result of letting it do so the flames touched my heart and branded it with a seal that allows me to willingly manifest and control the black flames."

With the snap of his fingers the ring of fire solidified into a solid obsidian-like disk, and upon its completion Rafe closed his eyes and, much to the surprise of Fiona, began to remove his overcoat and other articles of clothing. He tossed every piece into a pile at his feet after removing it, which grew larger and larger with each passing second until he reached the fatigue uniform all of his soldiers wore.

He peeled it off and when he threw it away, everyone in attendance for the eventual dual was flabbergasted by what was revealed by the removal of the uniform. As expected of a soldier, Rafe's upper body was toned and well built, the fruits of his labor and work in the Imperial Military broadcasted through the rippling muscles he possessed. What had shocked his observers was that covering pretty much ninety percent of his skin were all sorts of scars and marks from battles he had participated in, with the most prominent being the scar that stood out from all the rest. Located directly above his heart was a wicked-looking scar darker in color then the rest, and just from that alone Fiona knew that this was the mark that Amaterasu had left behind after he had endured the deadly flames in order to claim the Teigu as his own.

He let out a deep breath and clenched his fists, his eyes opening and bringing yet another surprise to his opponent. Rafe's normally greenish-blue eyes had transformed into a dark purple color with white irises, and only after blinking once did tears of pure blood trickle down his left cheek from the strain of his bloodshot eyes.

"Fiona, not many have had the opportunity to witness my Trump Card, the one true reason why I am known as Hell's Warden. Consider yourself lucky!" announced Rafe with a grin as he clapped his palms together and inhaled. "As the Warden of Hell, I command you to open! Gate of Hell!"

An enormous amount of power exploded out from Rafe when he finished speaking, the shockwave and winds he created forcing Fiona to brace herself and wait for them to die down so she could see properly. When a few moments passed Rafe lowered his hands and exhaled slowly, the air behind him distorting and warping just like before when he had teleported himself to the Imperial Capital.

" _Those portals again...are they actually his Trump Card?_ " thought Fiona with a confused expression when a few of the familiar pitch black ripples manifested behind Rafe.

The Lieutenant Colonel's grin widened ever so slightly and suddenly, without warning, dozens upon dozens of the same portals appeared, a literal wall taking shape behind him that stretched high into the sky and cast a dark glow onto the ground. Fiona started to feel nervous when from each ripple emerged every single weapon known to mankind, ranging from swords to lances to even axes. What was even scarier was that these weapons were made entirely out of the black flames of Amaterasu, so not only would they easily cut flesh...they would burn it as well.

"I won't be holding back, Fiona! Be careful!"

In an instant the battle began with Rafe launching several weapons from their ripples, the spears and swords flying at her as fast as bullets. Fiona darted to the right and she growled when they struck the ground and detonated in a brilliant fireball that emanated such heat she had to cover her face.

" _I can't let one of those hit me, let alone get close to me. The only way for me to beat Rafe is to move constantly and get in close enough to use my strongest technique._ " she told herself, which happened in less then a second since she had to avoid another barrage of flaming weapons.

Rafe swept his hand to the right and a row of portals materialized in the air close to Fiona, the ninja changing the direction of her retreat when they too began to unleash a barrage weapons that tracked her like heat-seeking missiles.

To get some of the bothersome projectiles off her back she stabbed her sword into the earth and stopped on a dime, the sky instantly darkening when several storm clouds appeared above.

"Thunder Gate!" she proclaimed, Rafe squinting his eyes when the two massive lightning bolts came down from the sky and vaporized every single weapon that was in the immediate radius around her.

To follow up with her attack Fiona removed Kaminari from the dirt and aimed it up towards the storm clouds, Rafe raising an eyebrow out of curiosity for the reason why.

"Supreme Voltage!"

A third bolt of lightning shot out from the center of the storm and struck Fiona directly, her hair instantly standing on end as overwhelming amounts of electricity that would normally kill a human coursed through her veins and supercharged her muscles beyond their limits. When the lightning faded away her hair remained in its feral-like state and she sheathed her blade, small sparks dancing across her fingertips transferring over to the hilt.

" _She must be getting ready to use her strongest technique. I know that during our brief skirmish in the mountains that she needs to get in close to use it, so all I must do is keep her at bay with my Trump Card._ " thought Rafe with a slight grin before he reorganized the positions of his portals with the snap of a finger, several ripples closing and reopening all around Fiona to completely encircle her.

With the seemingly overwhelming odds surrounding her, Fiona chuckled a little under her breath and tightened her grip on Kaminari. She was pouring every last ounce of her energy into this technique, the pride and joy of her arsenal. It had taken many months of blood, sweat and tears to master her Teigu, and an extra two weeks of non-stop training on the highest peak of the Tyrann Mountains during raging storms. Lightning had been consistently coming down from the heavens every second around her, and finally, on the twelfth day, with the last ounce of strength she possessed, she drew Kaminari from its sheath with such speed that when a sole flash of lightning appeared before her...she literally cleaved it in two.

"This ends now!"

Fiona kicked up a cloud of dirt when she darted straight for Rafe, the weapons he had launched at her striking the piece of earth where she had been standing and erupting in a ball of fire. Left and right she leaped a rolled to avoid every single attack the Lieutenant Colonel threw at her, and when he compensated by doubling the amount of portals and fire gates, she began to create several shadow clones of herself that zipped and darted this way and that to confuse and disorientate him.

Rafe brought his hand down and a grouping of portals appeared in the air a few inches above the ground, several axes rising up and rocking back a few inches before rocketing at Fiona from almost point blank range. Two of her shadow clones dove in front of their path and took the blow for her while she leaped over the explosion and bounded for him against all odds.

"If I can't deter you from reaching me...then I will meet you head on!" bellowed Rafe when he held an arm back and created a portal within the hole of the ring floating behind him, his hand dipping into its black depths and grasping some unknown object.

He pulled out a massive sword made of black fire and took a single step forward while he brought his arm back around the swipe at Fiona when she drew near, the female ninja seeing this and modifying her strategy mid-step.

Tatsumi, Esdeath and the others were glued on both opponents when they got within a couple of feet of one another, the leading edge of Rafe's sword coming ever closer to Fiona's right shoulder while her hand remained around the hilt of Kaminari. With the longer reach of his blade Rafe knew he could hit Fiona before she could reach him, but when he felt like his victory was assured, Fiona's body flickered and she covered the short gap between them in the blink of an eye...which meant the reach and lethality of his weapon was negated.

" _Shit!_ "

"Ultimate Art: Raikiri!"

Fiona unsheathed Kaminari and slashed at Rafe's gut with the white-hot blade, the sword cutting through his midsection near his right hip and exiting his body out of the opposite hip. Nothing happened at first, but as soon as the Teigu left his flesh, a devastating shockwave exploded out from the duo followed by a blinding light and enormous heat surge that made the Jaegers and members of Night Raid watching rear back a little.

" _Such overwhelming power...and it was all from a single blade swing?_ " thought Akame when the light vanished, revealing Fiona and Rafe standing mere inches apart from one another.

As soon as Fiona sheathed her blade, she caught Rafe when he almost collapsed to his knees at the huge gash in his side that had been created from her blade. The skin had charred over from the heat from the attack, and one glance at the landscape behind him revealed the sudden release of all of the stored up electricity had done the same thing to the land as it did to him. The ground was charred black in a wide arc that stretched for several hundred meters, with small pockets of steam rising up from the dirt in certain areas along the scar.

"Damn...you hit hard for a girl…" snickered Rafe with a heavy cough, his taunt making Fiona roll her eyes as she lifted him back to his feet.

"What am I going to do with you…?"

At that moment Tatsumi and Esdeath came to their side alongside Wave, Chelsea, Akame, Leone and Maya. Chelsea already had an opened bottle of Solomon's blood in her hand, but when she went to give it to Rafe he held a hand up and shook his head.

"Don't, I'll be fine. If I let a wound heal through other means beside the natural way, it'll damage my pride." he said with a weak smile, the Jaeger glancing back at Tatsumi with a raised eyebrow.

He shrugged and she put the cork back in the bottle before returning it to its brethren within the satchel, Rafe tapping Fiona on the shoulder to tell her he was able to stand with his own strength.

"You do realize I held back on that technique, right?" stated Fiona as they started to head back towards the capital, the Lieutenant Colonel paling a little.

"That was from you holding back?"

"Well duh, of course it was. I didn't want to kill you."

"What happens when you go full-power?" asked Wave somewhat nervously.

"Usually the person struck with the technique disintegrates instantaneously." replied Fiona happily, the others just staring at her with looks of shock.

"Okay then...good to know."

They returned to the capital and after saying goodbye for now, Fiona took Rafe to the hospital where he was admitted and thanks to the skilled doctors, he had the scarred skin removed so that the wound could begin to heal itself on its own. When the patches and medical tape had been wrapped around his midsection to cover up the gash, Fiona handed him his clothes so he could begin to put them back on.

"So you really can't feel that?" asked Fiona when, even after making movements that would normally cause someone with an injury such as his to wince and groan, Rafe finished slipping on his overcoat.

"Not a thing. I told you I don't feel pain any more, and you saw for yourself how many scars I've received." replied Rafe with a chuckle as they left his room and eventually the hospital itself.

"Well I hope the scar that I gave you will be your last. I don't want to lose you again."

Rafe stopped his feet and looked at Fiona, his heart tightening up in his chest a little because of how she worded the sentence and from the expression she had on her face after she lowered her face mask. Instantly he was reminded of the situation the pair shared between one another as a result of the revolution...and it was in those few seconds of realization that he now had a new reason to stay alive.

"Fiona, don't worry about that. If you haven't realized by now, It's going to take a lot to kill me. I'm not leaving your side any time soon, and once this damned revolution is over with...I will marry you. I promise." he said while wrapping an arm around her shoulder and bringing her in close, which caused Fiona's cheeks to become bright red.

He made them turn an even darker shade of red when he planted a kiss on the side of her cheek and squeezed her arm as they made their way back towards the Parliament Building to finalize the plans for the return of the Western Nations to the revolution. However, they had no clue about the figure watching them from afar with a devilish smile on her face as the wind blew her long flowing white hair.

" _So...the Lieutenant Colonel defected alongside his entire division..._ " thought Kahfka with a giggle. " _But first…_ "

He turned her head ever so slightly to the right and spotted her first two victims, who were patrolling the outskirts of the city in case any other unwanted visitors from the Empire were to arrive at the now freed Western Nations.

" _It's time to have some fun._ "


	37. Despair

A/N *dramatic and ominous piano music plays once again by a dude with crazy hair* Uh oh, shit's about to go down. Although, I'm excited that I finally get to showcase the abilities Kahfka developed on her own after becoming a user of Demon's Extract. This is going to be fun. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 36 - Despair**

"So how was that fight between Fiona and the Lieutenant Colonel?" asked Mine of Leone as the pair made their way through the less crowded streets near the outer edge of New Kannath.

"It was short, but damn was it exciting. Rafe's Trump Card is so powerful I can't believe something like it exists. He was able to make these portals and launch weapons out from them like bullets, and there were so many of them too." explained Leone with a huge grin on her face, the pink-haired sniper listening intently to the entire story.

However, they both stopped suddenly when a certain smell each Night Raid member knew from experience in their line of work. It was the smell of fresh blood, which rang all sorts of bells within the two girls as they sprinted towards the direction it was coming from, the lioness taking point after activating her Teigu so that she could use her heightened senses.

"This way." she said over her shoulder as she bounced around a corner, Mine following behind her at the best of her abilities since she had to carry Pumpkin's carrying case over her shoulder.

" _I wish I could move around like that…_ " thought Mine with a frown out of jealously for Leone's enhanced mobility thanks to the belt she wore around her waist.

They passed by the last row of houses and came to a standstill at what was happening before them just a few meters away.

"Hey, what do you think you're doing?!" demanded Leone with a snarl, the person standing across from them bringing down the blade in their hand and giggling.

"Oh my, it seems I've been found out…"

"Wait a minute...I recognize that voice…" murmured Mine.

The person turned their head and glanced back at them with a grin, Leone and Mine gasping upon realizing that the person staring at them was the girl that had been with Jacqueline when they were fleeing from the Empire. And apparently in the time since then, she had been transformed into almost a perfect copy of the Great General, right down the way she talked and that cocky grin of hers.

"If you're here, then that means that psychopath of a Great General is too, right?" asked Mine after attaching Pumpkin's long barrel part and aiming the weapon at the assassin.

Kahfka giggled again before she forcibly removed her weapon from the back of the person she had murdered and flicked the blood off, her eyes widening a fraction of an inch. "That's a secret...I might tell you if you can catch me though!"

In a flash she took off, both Leone and Mine growling in frustration before the older Night Raid member grabbed Mine, threw her over her shoulders and gave chase after Kahfka on all fours. The smaller girl held on for dear life around Leone's neck with one arm, but when she finally managed to regain control of herself she proceeded to attach the eye scope that came with Pumpkin to her ear, took aim, and fired a bolt of spirit energy at the fleeing Kahfka. To her shock the assassin vanished in a flash of purple and reappeared from thin air a foot away from her previous position, the bolt zooming past her and doing absolutely nothing.

" _What the hell?!_ " she thought before attempting to hit Kahfka again, but just like the first time Kahfka avoided her attack from behind with the same teleportation ability.

"Mine it's pointless to keep trying, she must use a Teigu that enables her to transport herself like that." said Leone when their prey ducked to the right into a tall patch of grass.

When she saw them follow her into the depths of the long flowing plains Kahfka's grin morphed into a demonic smile brimming with malicious intent, her grip around Cypher tightening when her plan started to come together.

" _Yeah, that's it...just keep following me to your graves._ " she thought evilly before making another sharp turn towards a clearing she had marked earlier.

A couple of meters later she ran out of the tall grass and came to a halt at the opposite side when Leone and Mine emerged behind her, the smaller assassin dismounting from Leone and pointing Pumpkin at her again with a scowl on her face.

"There's nowhere for you to run and hide out here, my sense of smell in this form is impeccable." boasted Leone with a smirk while cracking her knuckles, her beastial instinsts beginning to kick in.

Kahfka giggled again as she fully turned her body around in order to place a hand on her hip and glare at the duo, Leone and Mine hiding their surprise when they noticed the difference in her eyes and that one was no longer the green color she had.

"What happened to you?" asked Mine to get a little information out of the girl, Kahfka raising an eyebrow and flipping back a lock of her hair.

"Oh nothing really, just got some body enhancements here and there, just like my friend. To be honest I was waiting for him to return to the Imperial Capital so that I could continue training, but…" Instantaneously Kahfka's entire demeanor soured with the changing of her expression to one so filled with hate and rage it sent chills running up and down Mine's back. " _You_ killed him. He was more to me and Jacqueline outside of being a bodyguard...I'm going to slaughter you for making her cry."

Mine and Leone braced themselves with an intoxicating amount of bloodlust and power blew past them as an invisible force so strong it caused their hair to whip behind them wildly, their eyes widening in horror when it dawned on them that this feeling was similar…. _extremely_ similar.

" _This aura...it's so dark and vile. It's just like…no, that's not possible!_ " thought Leone with terror in her expression when two pairs of horns made of pinkish-red ice emerged from Kahfka's head and glinted in a sunlight, the assassin giggling while she unbuttoned her trench coat.

Kahfka's right eye morphed from its usual green color to a blood red, the pupil shrinking into a slit, and its white sclerae morphed into a dark grey as she entered an unusual transformation. She finished with the last button of her trench coat and slipped it off, revealing her voluptuous body for them to see as well as the red markings that had appeared on her body in certain areas as well as her cheeks, giving her the overall appearance of a demon.

Leone only had to take one look at the skin just above her cleavage to have her worst fears realized. Resting comfortably at the base of her neck was the tattoo marking a user of Demon's Extract, the very same Teigu Esdeath used and was supposed to be the _only_ user.

"Y-You can use Demon's Extract? That's impossible! Esdeath's the only user of that Teigu!" stammered Mine in defiance, but Kahfka only grinned at her whilst manifesting a shard of ice in the air above her left hand in order to twirl it around her index finger.

"Not any more. Remember when she had her arm cut off? We took the arm and removed the blood out of it, and long story made short...I am now a full-fledged wielder of Demon's Extract." she stated in a sing-song tone before she snapped her fingers and created several thousand razor-sharp copies of the original shard of ice in the air behind her. "And unlike Esdeath's flashy and devastating area-of-effect techniques...mine are geared more towards _assassination_."

She threw her arm forward and sent the cloud of small icicles flying towards Leone and Mine, but thanks to Pumpkin's exceptional ability, Mine quickly brought up the rifle and blasted them all away with a giant beam of spirit energy.

"Keep her occupied Leone! You know the plan!" said Mine with a cocky smirk, Leone glancing back at her for a second and nodding.

She crouched down on all fours and bounded at Kahfka, swiping at her head with her claws while at the same time using her feet to try and knock off balance with kicks and jabs at her legs. Kahfka giggled the entire time like a little school girl as she blocked and parried her strikes with ease just by creating small barriers of ice, and when she found an opening she reared back and landed a punch in Leone's stomach that knocked the wind out of her and broke several of her ribs.

"Is this really all you can offer?"

The Lioness chuckled under her breath when, to Kahfka's surprise, she wrapped her hands around her arm tightly and held on with monstrous strength, the assassin glaring at her opposite with beastial eyes.

"Try me. Mine!"

"On it!" exclaimed the pink sniper as she pulled down the trigger and fired a spirit energy bolt right at Kahfka's temple.

A wall of ice materialized from the ground next to her in order to stop the attack dead in its tracks while she ripped her hand out of Leone's strangle-hold and leaped back a few meters. "Weissschlund!" she bellowed, an incredibly dense boulder of ice forming in the air in front of her, before she kicked it with both feet at the lioness.

The ball split apart down the middle and opened itself up to create a gaping maw filled with razor sharp icicles, and it took a split second reaction for her to dive to the side in order to avoid being caught within the deathtrap. The boulder struck the ground behind her after losing some altitude and shattered into tiny little bits and pieces, Kahfka frowning at the failed technique for a moment until she revised her strategy and dropped Cypher.

"Kalt Grausamkeit!"

She threw her arm forward and generated an incredibly sharp spear of ice that lanced out at Mine, growing so incredibly fast in such a short amount of time that Leone barely got there in time to bash the weapon away with a punch and save her comrade.

" _They're watching each other's backs...I need to separate them._ " thought Kahfka as she removed her arm from the broken ice spear and flexed her fingers, several crystals of ice forming in the air behind her shoulders to wait for the time of their use.

"Thanks Leone."

"No problem, can't have our Genius Sniper go down can I?" asked Leone with a wink.

They returned their attention to their opponent and got another chill up their spines when she started to laugh, the pair tensing up in preparation for whatever she had planned next. Kahfka brought her head up and gave them all a twisted smile seen only on the craziest of psychopaths, one befitting of someone who is a subordinate of the Great General.

"You two really think you can beat me? That is rich! All this time you thought you were keeping up with me and matching my skills...but, that's not the case." giggled Kahfka before she inhaled a deep breath and leaned forward. "Arktis Schneesturm."

She unleashed a massive cloud of sub-arctic air laced with tiny ice crystals that washed out over the clearing and completely encompassed Leone and Mine, the ice hidden within making tiny little tears in Mine's clothes and Leone's bare skin. She brought her arms up to shield her face alongside Mine and they attempted to see and or sense their opponent, but while Mine was at a loss for what to do, her animal-like partner could still perfectly smell Kahfka in the cloud and make out her position easily.

" _Nice try. You can hide yourself, but you can't hide your scent from me!_ "

"Mine, she's directly in front of us!" she yelled out above the raging whirlwind, the pink-haired sniper nodding her head as she brought up Pumpkin and aimed straight ahead.

"Leone, duck!"

She did just that and Mine unleashed her Teigu's Trump Card, the blade-like blast of spirit energy sweeping through the cloud and vaporizing the grass in its path. A few seconds after Mine used her Trump Card the arctic cloud vanished, revealing Kahfka standing completely unharmed a few yards away from them.

" _She must've ducked underneath the attack._ " thought Mine as a gentle hiss echoed out from Pumpkin, telling her the weapon was currently cooling down after the sudden output of spiritual energy.

" _I think I'm going to play around with them a little longer...this is starting to become amusing._ " thought Kahfka with a slight grin as she created two blades of ice and twirled them around in her hands, her eyes set on Leone.

Without a word she darted towards her and reinstigated the close-quarters fight from earlier, the two combatants trading heavy blows with one another in an attempt to outmatch each other. Kahfka lunged at Leone's side with an ice sword and cut into her skin, going deep enough to draw blood and force Leone to retreat for a moment to rethink her plan of attack.

"Do you feel scared yet?" asked Kahfka with a sneer, Leone growling angrily at her.

"Why don't you just shut up!?" yelled Mine as she fired another massive blast of spiritual energy from her Teigu.

Kahfka brought her hand up and manifested another large wall of ice, but to her shock the barrier failed almost instantaneously and she was knocked back several meters into the scar produced by Pumpkin's Trump Card from earlier. She rolled to a stop and grunted, a tingling sensation close to what it felt like to be electrocuted washing over every single one of her limbs and paralyzing her for a few seconds.

"Leone now!"

Leone cleared the distance in between her and Kahfka and reared back for a brutal punch that threw Kahfka back to the ground, a secondary kick to the gut sending her rolling away for another few yards. She was about to press her advantage before Kahfka brought an arm up and clenched her fist, Leone's eyes shooting wide open and a gasp escaping from her lips when multiple icicles emerged from the dirt around her and impaled her through the gut.

She dropped to her knees and then onto her stomach, Kahfka giggling as she got back onto her feet and strode over to Leone with several more icicles floating in a circle around her left hand.

"This is where weak vermin like you belong...on the ground underneath the boots of the strong." she said viciously when she brought down her hand and imbedded the icicles through every joint in Leone's arms and legs, pinning her to the ground and taking her out of the fight.

She was about to finish off the lioness before she was warded off by another quick shot from Pumpkin, Mine taking a couple of steps forward and scowling at her.

"Mine, don't...you need to get out of here!" murmured Leone through the blood dripping from her lips, her friend looking down at her and smiling.

"I ran away once before...and because of that, Sheele died. I'm not running away again." she replied before she returned her gaze to Kahfka and frowned. "I _am_ a Genius Sniper, after all."

Kahfka smirked at her boast and twirled one of her swords around while Mine removed the scope from her eye and tossed it to the side, a quick glance at Pumpkin and the condition it was in telling her that she could use its Trump Card a few more times.

"You really think you can kill me with that Teigu of yours?" asked Kahfka, Mine glaring at her in silent fury.

"I don't think, I know."

She whipped Pumpkin back up and fired at Kahfka to get her on her toes, the assassin rolling to the side and bounding off her right foot like a sprinter towards her. Mine's lip curled up slightly when the pieces of her plan fell into place, and when she felt that Kahfka had gotten close enough, the danger to her life now through the roof, she cocked Pumpkin to the side and pressed down on the trigger _hard_.

Kahfka had to duck at the last second to avoid the sword-like beam Mine threw at her, but what she wasn't expecting was for Mine to immediately fire off the Trump Card at a different angle then the previous one.

It was far too late and she was already sprinting at full speed...and with no other options left the beam struck her in the gut and cleaved her in two, her arms flying off in different directions while her upper body hit the ground a few seconds before her waist and legs.

" _That's what you get._ " thought Mine victoriously before lowering the steaming Pumpkin and letting out a sigh of relief.

"Alright Leone, I'm coming to help you out."

She turned her back on Kahfka and set down Pumpkin in the grass in order to use both hands to pull out the shards of ice from her friend's limbs. She only realized afterwards that this was a horrible, _horrible_ decision.

All of a sudden Mine stumbled forward a couple of steps while blood exploded out from her left shoulder, her eyes gravitating to the razor sharp icicle stabbed through her clothes and skin.

Leone could only watch in terror as Mine whimpered at the unnatural and paralyzing agony that coursed through her veins when a sinister laugh emerged from the grass to their left. Beyond all belief, out from within emerged Kahfka, completely without a scratch whatsoever and with a devilish smile plastered on her face.

"H-How did you survive?! You should be dead!" sputtered Leone.

"You may have a good sense of smell, but that won't help you discern the real person from a fraud." replied Kahfka before she snapped her fingers, the corpse they thought was her disintegrating into several tiny ice particles that blew away in the wind.

"Now then...let's have some _fun_."

She was right on top of Mine in the blink of an eye, and with a harsh punch to her jaw she sent the smaller girl tumbling across the ground to the left for several meters. She grunted and spit up blood when she finally stopped rolling and looked up at Leone, her truly terrified expression burning itself into her brain.

"Mine, just run. You can't beat her! Find Tatsumi, find Esdeath, anyone! Just _run_!" pleaded Leone desperately to try and keep her friend alive, but against her wishes Mine slowly got back into her feet and wiped the blood from her lips.

"I'm not running...and even if I did she would still hunt me down." she said with a shaky tone, Kahfka's deranged giggle resurfacing once again in response.

"She's not wrong...but let's see if you can actually save your friend."

She crossed her arms and watched Mine clench her jaw muscles and growl under her breath, every single ounce of her anger getting directed towards her through just her gaze alone. She started to walk towards the pinned Leone, and the lioness could only watch with a pained heart as Kahfka, whenever she would get close, would kick back Mine with devastating force and then send another icicle shard through her body, the first going through the left side of her torso, and then the third ramming itself through her right thigh.

Her clothes were tattered and blood stained, and the pain from her wounds was making it hard to see and walk, so much so that she collapsed onto her knees after the fourth attempt.

"Fuck you...you fucking bastard!" snarled Leone angrily while Kahfka continued to smile at how much pain she was putting Mine through.

"Why don't you try again, little girl?" asked Kahfka eagerly, Mine coughing up more blood again as she slowly got back onto her feet.

" _I can't...run away, not after what happened to Sheele…_ " she thought, determined to keep pushing forward.

Kahfka watched with interest as Mine hobbled towards Leone with what little strength she had left, and when she fell back down, this time onto her stomach, she still continued to crawl towards her friend with traces of tears forming in the corner of her eyes. When her body could no longer respond to her brain's commands she slowly reached out with her one working arm towards Leone, their eyes glued on one another.

"Mine...please…" asked Leone in almost a whisper, the sorry sight occurring before her too much too handle.

"I-I'm...sorry…" murmured Mine before smiling one last time, a single tear rolling down her cheek and striking the grass between them.

Meanwhile Kahfka, standing just a few feet away from the pair, brought up one of her hands and lost all sense of humanity in her expression as she tightened her fingers into a fist and brought an end to their moment swiftly. "Ausführung."

Quicker then lightning, a larger ice spear formed from the earth directly underneath Mine, impaling her through the gut and taking her up a couple of feet off the ground before, to Leone's horror, two large semi-spheres of ice formed on either side of her and slammed together like the mouth of a beast clamping shut tightly around it prey. Mine's body vanished in a fountain of blood that shot out from the tiniest of gaps in between the two ice blocks, the force produced by their connection so powerful it instantly crushed every single bone in her body and liquified it...leaving behind no trace of her existence except for the huge red stains that covered the ice and the large puddle that started to accumulate on the ground.

Leone was utterly silent, her eyes as wide as the moon, and plastered on her face was an expression so horror-filled, so gut-wrenching, one would think she had just watched the death of a sister or brother. In a sense, Mine was a family member to her. They had been comrades-in-arms as members of Night Raid and close friends, and after watching her get brutally executed before her very eyes as she laid there unable to do anything to stop it...something inside her broke into a million pieces.

"Hmm...oops. I didn't want to kill her _that_ quickly…" remarked Kahfka sarcastically with a light-hearted giggle as she peeked around the bloodbath and caught a glance at Leone. "Oh don't give me that look. You're gonna make me feel all giddy inside."

She casually strolled over to Leone and crouched down beside her, gently placing a hand on top of her head and looking at the spot where Mine had once been just a few seconds before, the lioness doing nothing to stop her.

"You feel that lump in your throat? That bottomless pit developing in the bottom of your heart? It's _despair_. Just take a moment to think about what will happen next." said Kahfka, the tears in Leone's eyes starting to roll down her cheeks. "Your body locks up, you lose all sense of hope in your mind and soul. And you and I both know that despair is a lot like gravity. All it takes is a little...push."

As soon as she finished her sentence Leone completely broke down into an onslaught of tears, crying out and trying with all her might to break free of the icy restraints pinning her to the ground. Kahfka knew that at this point there was no chance of Leone attacking her, so she granted her wish and dissolved the icicles stabbed through Leone's limbs so that she could painfully drag herself over to the ice and pull herself up its surface to place a hand on it. It was the only way for her to believe that she was somehow still there with her, even though there was no corpse left behind.

Kahfka felt several presences heading their way, so she quickly grabbed her trench coat and Shingu before teleporting away into the forest of plain grass to escape. A short while after she left Tatsumi, Esdeath and Run crested the small hill behind Leone and saw her first thing above anything else.

"Leone!? What happened!" asked Tatsumi as they ran up to her, Esdeath's eyes gravitating to the blood-stained hemisphere of ice.

Tatsumi struggled to pry Leone away from the horrific structure, and he couldn't even get a proper answer out of her through the tears and cries of sorrow coming from the usually optimistic and bodacious lioness. It was totally uncharacteristic of her, and his mind was going at one hundred miles per hour to try and figure out the reason behind this shocking change in his friend.

Run scanned the scarred clearing and when he spotted something resting on the ground a few feet away, he walked over to it and felt an extreme sense of sorrow wash over his body at seeing what it was.

"Guys…" he said over his shoulder, Tatsumi and Esdeath turning their heads towards him as he picked an object up and showed it to them.

A rope wrapped itself around Tatsumi's heart and squeezed as tight as it could when he saw Pumpkin resting in Run's arms, his eyes returning to the bloodied ice and, like a boulder, the realization hit him.

"Oh god…" muttered Esdeath when the truth dawned on her as well, the three Jaegers all staring at what they now knew to be the final resting spot of Mine.

There was going to be no need for a burial...there was nothing left behind to bury. Mine was gone, in every sense of the word.

"Leone...who did this? Where did this ice come from?" asked Run to try and think of a rational way through this dire situation, the blonde looking up at him and sniffing heavily.

"I-It was one of J-Jacqueline's subordinates...s-she…"

"She what?" questioned Esdeath.

"She could use Demon's Extract…" stuttered Leone, a fresh batch of tears emerging from the corners of her eyes. "She killed her...she _killed_ her…"

If they weren't already shocked beyond belief, learning that Esdeath wasn't the only user of Demon's Extract and that this new user was one of their enemies completely blew everything out of the water. Tatsumi glanced back at his wife and they both had the same thought...the only way there could been another Demon's Extract user would have to have been from when she had gotten one of her arms cut off and that her blood must've been drawn out from it.

After taking a few moments to make a silent farewell out of respect for their friend, they took Leone back to the capital to have her wounds treated and to break the news to Najenda and the other Night Raid members. Lubbock didn't believe them at first, but when he and Akame saw just how badly wounded Leone was before Run took her to the hospital...they realized it was all genuine. The sharp-tongued, pink-haired assassin they had all come to love, and hate sometimes, was never going to come back.

With nothing else left to say or do until Leone got back and they received word back from Solomon and Camilla from the east...they retired to the place given them to act as their home in New Kannath to sit in utter silence and try to move on from the death of their friend.

* * *

A/N For those who need translations

Weissschlund - White Maw

Arktis Schneesturm - Arctic Snowstorm

Ausführung - Execution


	38. Newcomers

A/N Guys, I know this is a pretty early upload, but...I have something to say first. I'd like for all of us to have a moment of silence to remember those who died on this day in the September 11th Terrorist Attacks on the World Trade Center in 2001. Many brave firemen and normal, everyday civilians lost their lives trying to save the people trapped within the twin towers, and we cannot forget the brave passengers of United Airlines Flight 93 who attempted to take back their aircraft from the hijackers whom were attempting to crash it either into the White House or the Capitol Building. Those names marked on the 9/11 Memorial, and the actions that some of them took to not save themselves, but to save the lives of others, should not, and _must not_ **_ever_** be forgotten. So please, just take a few seconds out of your day to remember those who gave the ultimate sacrifice.

...

Okay, thank you for allowing me to get that out of the way. I was too little to remember what happened, but after seeing the attacks and what transpired in the many documentaries that came afterwards, I can't help but feel overwhelming sadness for those who were there in person and for the many families who were so deeply effected and scarred by these attacks. *Takes deep breath*. Let's move on shall we?

*Ahem...I hate myself. Why must my brain think up all of these brutal deaths. IT'S EVEN WORSE THEN THE ORIGINAL MANGA. Mine goes into a coma in the manga, cool. In the anime, she dies from...something to do with Pumpkin overheating/using too much energy? Hell if I know. And in my story, she gets crushed to death. Instant body liquification. Fuck my LIFE. I shit you not, whenever I finish the chapters I send them to a friend of mine to see them early, because he's an impatient little fuck, hehe he's awesome, and I asked him on a scale of 1 to "I'm going to hell", how bad have the character deaths been so far? He told me that I was Satan's Grandfather. True story. Anyways, we're getting close to the final stretch people, we gotta be ready for the end. I personally have been stockpiling a shit ton of Mountain Dew and Doritos, so I feel like I'm ready.

Also, guys, I have something really exciting to say. Even though I wasn't planning on doing it, I recently had a great idea that may allow me to do it. Basically, what I'm getting that is there is a possibility that I actually might write a sequel to this story! It may happen, it may not, but the idea is on the table. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 37 - Newcomers**

 **\- Eastern Territory of the Empire -**

 **\- One Day Later -**

"That's another army that bites the dust. If we keep moving forward like this we'll be at the Shisuikan in no time." said Solomon with a grin after he and Camilla returned to the bridge of the airship they were using as their mobile command center, the ground troops of Straelka setting up camp in the meantime below.

"And after that is the Imperial Capital." added on Camilla while setting down her sword and shield, the Princess letting out a sigh of relief. "I hope the others were able to make it to the Western Nations without too much trouble."

"I'm sure they're fine. I bet we're going to be hearing from them soon enough." said Solomon to reassure her.

No less then a couple of seconds later the intercom crackled and one of the commanding officers stationed on the ground coughed, the airship captain pressing his finger to a button next to the speaker. "Do you have anything to report?"

"Yes, this message needs to go directly to the Princess and her confidante."

"I'm here, you may speak." spoke up Camilla as she took the Captain's spot, Solomon standing right beside her with his eyes glued on the speaker.

"A messenger arrived from the Western Nations. We checked to ensure he wasn't a spy, and everything checked out. The message he was carrying is this, "This is General Kagetane Hiruko, surviving General of the Western Nations military. We have successfully retaken our nation with the assistance of the Jaegers and Night Raid, and as a bonus the Imperial Army division known as the "Hellraisers" have defected and joined the revolution. We shall be commencing our push towards the Imperial Capital." End message."

Camilla's lips curled up into a smile as she looked over at Solomon, the Jaeger returning the gesture and chuckling at the success of their friend's expedition to their allies in the west.

"I knew they could do it."

"Okay, tell the messenger to return back with this. We will capture the Fortress Shisuikan and hold it until your forces arrive, assuming as well that the Revolutionary Army and Path of Peace will also be joining the endeavor."

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

 **\- The Next Day -**

Jacqueline removed her hand from the dirt just outside the capital's walls and smirked a little, the final piece in her plan of protecting the city from the eventual siege everyone knew was coming now complete. She wiped her hand clean on her trench coat and stretched out her back, the two Faceless guards standing close by to the gate remaining rigidly still while waiting for her.

" _These Faceless sure are incredibly loyal...no wonder the Prime Minister uses them to guard himself and the interior of the palace. Unlike the Imperial Guards under my command, they don't talk back or voice their own opinions. I'll have to keep that in mind…_ " she thought as she walked over to them so that they could all return to the Imperial Palace as a group.

"You know, you Faceless intrigue me. You serve the Prime Minister with unquestionable loyalty and remain silent at all times, and I never see you outside of the Imperial Palace. Do you have any other duties?" asked Jacqueline out of the blue, the two Faceless saying nothing.

"Oh come on, you aren't in the presence of Honest, so you can speak if you want to."

One of the Faceless turned his head slightly to the right to look at his partner and after a few moments of silently staring at one another, the Faceless on the right exhaled deeply and cleared his throat.

"You are the first person the Faceless has ever encountered that would willingly allow one of the members to speak freely."

"Yes...our Commanding Officer, employed by the Prime Minister himself, trained us to always remain silent and to accept every order without question. So talking is...unorthodox to us."

Jacqueline raised an eyebrow in surprise and shoved her hands into her trench coat pockets, chuckling lightly. Finally hearing some of the infamous Faceless speak for the first time was something one never would be able to experience in their lifetimes, and being the first was definitely a rarity in of itself.

"Well, I'm honored. But now that I've actually managed to get you two to speak, let's talk a little. I'm interested to hear about the inner workings of the Empire's elite."

Jacqueline took them to a less-crowded park within the city where she knew that anyone who saw them would instantly walk the other way and not want to meddle in their affairs, and when they sat down on opposite park benches she was treated to an in-depth analysis of the life of a member of the Faceless.

All of the rumors about them being utterly loyal to the Prime Minister were true after all. From a very young age they were trained to listen only to the orders of their commanding officer and the Prime Minister, and that they were only a tool to be used by them. They had no names, and their armor was specifically designed to hide their identities in order to eliminate any ideas of individuality and free will.

The policy about not speaking whatsoever had been implemented to ensure no one would speak out and rebel against the orders they were given, no matter what sort of actions or consequences would result from them. And the reason for this was their duties did not just involve guarding the interior of the Imperial Palace and protecting the Prime Minister. The Faceless also acted as the Imperial Capital's secret police force that operated separately from the Imperial Military and assassination groups, that instead of targeting and assassinating enemies of the state...they were tasked with killing political dissidents and those the Prime Minister thought could interfere with his plans.

They operated under the cover of darkness, and none of their targets ever survived to tell the tale due to their rigorous training to be as silent as possible.

"Fascinating…do you enjoy serving the Prime Minister in such a way?" questioned Jacqueline, one of the Faceless shrugging his shoulders.

"Some do, yes, like our Commanding Officer, but for the rest such as myself and my partner here...what the Prime Minister has us do is cruel and heartless. Our purpose originally was to be the personal protectors of the Imperial family while the Imperial Guards protected the palace itself, but ever since the current Prime Minister came into the picture...that purpose has been twisted and morphed to suit his own nefarious needs."

"It's sickening is what it is. But if we attempt to speak out, we'll be killed on the spot." stated the second Faceless with a slight growl before he realized that they were speaking to the Great General and the capital's Head Torturer herself, who was another subordinate to the Prime Minister.

But when they thought she was going to hand them in to be tried as traitors or worse, kill them herself here in broad daylight, she surprised them by leaning her back up against the bench and sighing.

"This certainly satisfies my curiosity...but we must return to the Imperial Palace. The Prime Minister informed me earlier that his son was returning to the capital shortly with several others that could prove useful to us."

The Faceless nodded and they stood up with the Great General, returning to their usual silent and stoic personalities as they made the trek back to the Imperial Palace where, when no one was watching, they bid farewell with one another, with Jacqueline making a promise to speak with them some time.

" _Indeed…learning that there is even tension within the Empire's elite is certainly interesting._ " she thought with a tiny grin.

She arrived at the throne room in a couple of minutes and knocked on the doors, another pair of Faceless she knew were always inside at all times opening them up so that she could walk inside. Her eyes instantly darted to a group of individuals standing a few feet away from the throne where the Prime Minister stood, the Emperor was absent, their appearances differing drastically from one person to the next.

There were four men and two girls, and starting from the far left one man was lean, muscular with black hair and small silver eyes. Next to him was the strangest looking of the group, a large dark-skinned man dressed like a clown with a tiny baseball cap sitting atop his head and puffs of curly orange hair above his ears. With his arms crossed and eyes closed stood the third man just behind the clown, his outfit reminiscent of a samurai with black hair tied into a ponytail and a twig sticking out of his mouth.

When her eyes came upon the first girl she thought she must've been a kid no more then fifteen years old due to her tiny stature, light-colored dress, striped stockings and blond hair, and the young woman standing beside had her hair in a bob-style haircut with a bunny ear accessory. She wore a mini dress, a collar and watching wrist bands, boots and a pair of glasses.

The fourth man and person standing at the head of the group she undoubtedly assumed was the Prime Minister's son due to the way he carried himself and the horned crown her wore on his head, which resembled that of Honest's. Althought his appearance differed greatly from his father, where instead of white skin he was tan with green eyes, white hair and an x-shaped scar on his face, she knew that they were related.

"Ah, Great General, you've arrived. I'd like to introduce to you my son Syura and his companions." said Honest with a smile, the group turning to face her with judging gazes.

"So you're the Great General everyone is so afraid of. You seem harmless to me." said Syura with a cocky grin, Jacqueline's eyes narrowing a fraction of an inch as she crossed her arms and stared back at him.

"At least I don't look like a fool."

"What did you say?!" he snarled, the clown and samurai glancing at him with somewhat concerned expressions.

"Enough of that. Show some respect to your commanding officer, you little brat." said Honest darkly, Syura's skin crawling a little at the tone his father used to speak with him.

"S-Sure, whatever you say father." he replied as he quickly fixed his attitude and held a hand up to show Jacqueline the people he had brought with him.

"This is Enshin, a former pirate from the eastern seas, Izou is a famous swordsman, Champ is...Champ, the smaller girl is Dorothea, an alchemist, Cosmina is the other girl next to her, and of course I'm Syura."

"It's a pleasure." said Champ with a warm smile while Cosmina waved and Dorothea rolled her eyes.

"So what else are you besides being the Empire's Great General?" asked Enshin as he licked his lips with his abnormally long tongue, Jacqueline unfazed by the action and sighing.

"She also acts as the Head Torturer for the Reconditioning Department, so don't take her lightly."

"Kahfka!" exclaimed Jacqueline happily as her loyal subordinate and lover entered the throne room and nodded once at the Prime Minister before fixing her gaze on Syura and his gang of cronies.

"How was your journey to the Western Nations?"

Kahkfa laughed and placed a hand on her hip, "I was able to kill one of the Night Raid members there. I crushed her body and turned her into a pool of blood."

"Oh?" remarked Honest with great amount of surprise while Jacqueline smiled and hugged Kahfka out of thanks.

"And who are you supposed to be?" asked Dorothea as she took in Kahfka's revealing outfit and appearance from her toes to her eyes, the assassin crossing her arms over her chest and grinning.

"The name's Kahfka, Jacqueline's subordinate and partner, for your information." stated Kahfka blankly while showing off the ring on her finger.

"Oh? So you're a lesbian?" asked Enshin, the two women glaring at him and quickly shutting him up.

"Prime Minister, I don't mean to be rude, but some of the people your son has brought here… _displease_ me." stated Jacqueline in a low tone while glancing up at Honest, the Prime Minister holding his arms behind his back and shrugging.

"I have no control over my son's actions and decisions, as of now what happens to him and those with him are entirely up to you now."

Jacqueline's lips curled up into a malicious smile as she returned her gaze to Syura and the others, Kahfka giving them the same look when they began to think of ways to test if they are certainly worth keeping around.

"Well, for starters...I want to see if you all are at least decent fighters. Come with me."

Jacqueline and Kahfka took them to the Imperial Training Grounds where the office of the Great General resided, the Great General looking around the wide open field and determining that it would be the perfect place to test the abilities of Syura and his accomplices.

"So what exactly are we going to do here? Fight each other?" asked Cosmina after they stopped walking, the Great General beginning to unbutton her trench coat while giggling softly.

"Oh yes, that's _exactly_ what we're doing. The only way I can tell if someone is worth keeping alive or not is if I can see them in combat. That's how I discovered Kahfka. She survived while the rest of the Elite Seven and the Group of Terror died by my hands, including the leaders." stated Jacqueline over her shoulder before she dropped her trench coat and rolled her shoulders, Syura's eyes widening a little at her beautiful figure which contrasted heavily with Budo's appearance.

"Are you sure you're really the Great General? I remember that Lightning Geezer was exceptionally strong in both combat and in his physical appearance. You look like you belong in a tavern or something serving tea." he remarked again, Jacqueline's eye twitching a little.

"Why you…" growled Kahfka when she began to call upon Demon's Extract, but a quick shake of the head from her lover told her that she would handle the Prime Minister's son and his rude attitude.

"Yes, I know. However…"

Almost instantly she unleashed a massive amount of her vile and toxic killer intent that caused Syura and everyone with him to shudder and take a few steps back at how dark and ominous it was. Jacqueline fully turned around and treated them all to her psychotic smile as she held her arms out and extruded several razor-sharp bone rods from her forearms, Basilisk remaining coiled up at her side in case she needed to use the bone sword.

"I'm personally responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people, men, women and children. I stained the walls of the Shisuikan red with the blood of those pathetic revolutionaries, executed the head political figures of the Western Nations and easily fought the former General Esdeath, even going so far as to injure her by cutting off one of her arms." she proclaimed with absolute pride in her strength, Kahfka retreating to the edge of the training field in order to watch the slaughter she knew was coming.

" _You all have made a horrible mistake talking to Jacqueline like that. I'll be surprised if she doesn't kill one of them._ "

Thirty minutes later, just like she had thought about, Jacqueline absolutely tore into Syura and the others, actually killing the one named Enshin for the rude statement earlier about her being a lesbian. With a grin on her face she licked the blood clean off her fingers after she ripped his head and spinal cord out of his body, the Prime Minister's son, Champ, Dorothea, Cosmina and Izou staring at her with looks of horror painted on their faces.

"Y-You're psychotic…" stuttered Dorothea after Jacqueline lapped up the last drop of blood and Kahfka strolled over to her side with her trench coat.

"Thank you for the compliment. Anyways, now that you know I'm serious, I have a mission for all of you." said Jacqueline while she crossed her arms and put all of her weight on one foot. "We're going to capture two very annoying thorns in the Empire's side."

"And just who might they be?" asked Syura while she slipped her arms back through the sleeves of her trench coat.

"Two people that are of high interest to me...I want you lot to go to the Eastern Front and capture the Eastern Nation's army second-in-command, a man by the name of Solomon Glass. He's a Jaeger, so don't think it will be so simple to fight him of it comes to it."

"what about you? Who are you two going to capture?" asked Champ.

"Kahfka and I will handle the capture of the second person...the husband of the Empire's former Ice Queen."

A few hours later, after the newly christened "Wild Hunt" departed to seek out their target, with the only one not going with them being Dorothea since she had been tasked with something else important by the Great General, Jacqueline was strolling through one of the many gardens the Imperial Palace possessed and, much to her surprise, she discovered the Emperor squatting down next to a bed of flowers watching them closely and seemingly enjoying the fresh air.

"Your Highness? Is everything okay?" she asked, the child turning his head and smiling at her.

"Oh, yeah. Everything's fine, I'm just...looking at these flowers." he replied, Jacqueline detecting an underlying reason behind his words and crouching down next to him with a worried expression.

"Why's that? Is there something special with these specific flowers?"

The Emperor sighed a little and sat himself down on the grass, Jacqueline doing the same to show him she was intent on listening. "Well, when I was younger my parents and I would always come out here and look at the flowers."

"And your parents were…?"

"They died in their sleep. The Prime Minister told me it was because of a horrible disease unknown up until then."

As soon as the Prime Minister was mentioned red flags began to go up all over the place inside of her mind, the Great General hiding her reactions behind a facade of empathy for the child Emperor as she began to think not of the Empire...but of herself and the position of power she held.

And luckily for her...she had discovered something in her _research_ while not preparing the capital for the inevitable.

"The Prime Minister, you say? He told you personally? Not a doctor?"

"Yes, that's right. Why are you asking?" questioned the Emperor while looking right into Jacqueline's eyes.

Jacqueline prepared her reasons for what the child said next to the question she was about to ask, which would either prove to be successful or fail miserably. With that in mind, she took a deep breath and asked, "Do you trust the Prime Minister, your Highness?"

"Of course I do." he replied quickly.

"Are you so sure about that? Are you really not aware of what the Prime Minister does when he's not by your side?" pressed Jacqueline with a serious tone, the Emperor opening his mouth to say something again before he closed it and thought about what she had said.

Now that it was brought up before him, he realized that he really _did_ have no idea what the Prime Minister did outside of him being his adviser. And he judged by the tone of Jacqueline's voice that whatever he did that she was referring to was less then good-natured like he portrayed himself to be.

"W-What exactly do you mean?" he asked, nerve of what she would say.

"Well...let's just say the Prime Minister isn't exactly on your side, like he's led you to believe. And I'll start off by saying something that will change your view of him entirely. Are you prepared?" asked Jacqueline, the Emperor nodding his head slowly a few seconds later with a tinge of doubt in his gaze

"Okay then. Well, in my free time I like to look things up and research them, and one of the things I looked up was the death of your parents. Now, you may not like this, but I had an autopsy be done on your parents. It turns out that they had never had one done on them in the first place as per custom when someone dies of unknown causes,so when the results came back, the doctors found something...disturbing." said Jacqueline, the Emperor's expression and mood getting worse.

"D-Disturbing?"

Jacqueline nodded and looked down at her hands as she crossed her legs and twiddled her thumbs, her shoulders dropping as he sighed. "Yes. The truth is that your parents weren't killed by some unknown disease, since their was no evidence of a foreign bacteria or creature in their system. Instead, they found a different type of foreign object...a poison."

"A...poison? Are you saying my parents w-were...murdered?"

The Great General solemnly nod her head to confirm the truth, and almost instantly the Emperor's heart shattered into a million pieces. Tears emerged from the corner of his eyes and Jacqueline, to comfort the young ruler, wrapped an arm gently around his shoulder and embraced him softly.

"There's more. The person that murdered your parents...it was the Prime Minister. He was the one that killed your parents so that he could control you and make you his figure head so that he could do whatever he wanted."

"Then he needs to arrested and executed!" snarled the Emperor, but before things could get out of hand Jacqueline shushed him and smiled with a gleam in her eye.

"No, not yet. There's a time and place for thee things to occur. Believe me when I say this, your Highness, there are events that have been set in motion which will lead to the total destruction of the revolution...and the death of the Prime Minister."

"Are you sure?"

"Trust me. I promise as the Great General that I'll be sure to carry out my duties and ensure the safety of the Empire."

The Emperor stared into her eyes for a few more moments before his smile returned and he nod his head once, Jacqueline returning the expression and standing up with the boy to walk him back inside the Imperial Palace. While she maintained the caring mask on the outside, on the inside, her devious mind was at work formulating and moving on with the plan that she had been crafting for quite some time now.

It was all coming together. All that needed to happen now were for the last few pieces to fall into place.


	39. Dark Desires

A/N Uh oh, Jacqueline's up to something sneaky. And now the child Emperor is fully aware of the misdemeanors, to put it extremely lightly, of the Prime Minister. And with Wild Hunt now in the picture...what will become of Solomon and Tatsumi? Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 38 - Dark Desires**

 **\- Fortress Shisuikan -**

 **\- Two Days Later -**

It didn't take long for the Kingdom of Straelka's massive army to reach the gates of the Empire's heart, and with their overwhelming firepower on both the ground and in the air, not even the mighty Shisuikan with its obscenely thick walls could stand up to them. In a matter of hours the once pride and joy of the Empire's defenses fell to its enemies, and with their airships circling above while a perimeter was established, Solomon and Camilla entered the fortress itself from the courtyard.

"The surviving soldiers will be kept in the dungeons, and under no circumstances shall they be treated harshly. They may be our enemy, but we aren't savages." ordered Camilla to one of the commissioned officers at her side, the man saluting and running off.

"I don't think I ever told you this Camilla, but you make a fine military leader if I do say so myself." informed Solomon while shoving his hands into his pockets, the Princess glancing back at him and shrugging.

"That's because of my Father and Wilhem teaching me that kind of stuff. Since I was going to become the Kaiserin one day, they thought it smart to teach me military tactics and such at a young age so that I would be prepared."

"Smart."

They arrived at one of the tallest spires of the fortress and entered an office that, unknown to them, was formerly occupied by the Hellraiser Commander when the Surprise and Attack Division occupied the fortress. When they strolled over to the windows looking out over the Shisuikan and the men they lead scurrying around like ants beneath them, they looked to the west and smiled a little.

"Now all we have to do is wait for Tatsumi and the others."

 **\- Night Fall -**

Even while Camilla and Solomon slept with a platoon of Indigo Guard members dressed in full battle armor watching over them, the foot soldiers and tanks outside were on constant watch for any suspicious figures that could possibly approach the fortress under the cover of darkness. Even the airships above were assisting in this effort by lighting up the perimeter around the fortress with massive on-board spotlights that bathed anything caught underneath them in a brilliant white light.

"Damn...she wasn't kidding when she said the Eastern Nation's military is powerful. No wonder the Empire's been unable to do anything to them." whispered Syura as he and the rest of Wild Hunt crouched down behind a grouping of bushes far enough away from the fortress walls that they wouldn't be spotted by the airship spotlights.

"My sword craves for blood, but I will resist its urges for now so that we can complete our mission." said Izou while cracking open one of his eyes in order to survey the Shisuikan for himself.

"What are we going to do? And where would our target be anyways?" asked Cosmina, Syura smirking while he pointed to the tallest tower of the fortress with an index finger.

"They should be up there, the Princess and her second-in-command. The hard part will be getting in and out of the fortress, but thanks to this little wonder Dorothea cooked up for us before leaving…" he started, his eyes darting down to a small corked bottle in his grasp. "We'll easily be able to apprehend our target."

"That still doesn't explain how we'll be _getting_ inside." murmured Champ.

Syura pulled off a small purple and silver device from his belt and held it up for everyone to see, its surface glistening lightly when a search light passed by close to their hiding spot. "My Teigu, Shambhala, will be our ticket inside. I'll teleport Izou and I inside and we'll capture our target while you guys stay out here to secure us an escape route if we're discovered."

Cosmina nod her head in approval with Champ and Syura glanced at Izou, the samurai grunting while grasping his sword, Kōsetsu. Syura closed his fingers tightly around Shambhala and in the blink of an eye, he and Izou vanished in a flash of purple light, a special seal remaining in the grass where they were once standing.

They reappeared atop one of the higher buildings within the Shisuikan and they instantly ducked down to make themselves as hard to detect as possible, and when he felt like the coast was clear Syura motioned with his hand to Izou for him to follow, the duo silently creeping along the roof tiles towards their target destination. They teleported once more into the tower staircase and sneaked their way to the top, their final obstacle standing just a few feet away in the form of the Indigo Guard protecting the bedroom where Princess and their target slept.

" _Alright Dorothea, let's see if this actually works._ " thought Syura as Izou handed him a mask to filter out clean air before uncorking the bottle in his hand and lightly rolling into the open.

One of the guards noticed the bottle and he immediately grew suspicious of it before, all of a sudden, his eyes shot wide open and he, alongside his three other companions, began to cough and claw at their throats as the airborne toxin was inhaled through their nostrils and mouths. In a matter of seconds they collapsed to the floor, knocked out cold and unable to stop Syura and Izou from strolling towards the door they were guarding.

Inside the bedroom Solomon woke up from the dead of sleep when he heard the noises coming from outside and he shook Camilla awake, the pair fixing their gazes on the door. They expected someone to come inside, but after a few seconds Solomon sniffed and almost instantly detected a different smell in the air.

" _Shit, there's a gas in here!_ " he thought frantically, but when he turned to try and get Camilla out of the room as soon as possible, he found her slumped over on her side in a comatose state.

"Dammit…" he cursed as he got out of the bed and felt his legs become weak, his vision becoming blurry when the toxin started to affect him as well.

He too finally collapsed to the ground and, right on que, Izou and Syura walked into the room and approached the fallen Jaeger with a rope in the latter's hands. They tied the arms and ankles of their target tightly just in case Dorothea's toxin wore off sooner then expected, and when that was completed Izou hoisted Solomon over his shoulder while Syura activated Shambhala.

They reappeared next to their comrades and Champ took over as the one to carry Solomon before they sprinted off into the night, their kidnapping of their target successful. One down...only one more to go.

 **\- New Kannath -**

At the same time as Wild Hunt captured their target, Jacqueline and Kahfka penetrated the capital of the Western Nations and leapt from rooftop to rooftop towards the Parliament Building in the center of the city. There were both Western Nation soldiers and Hellraisers patrolling the streets now after Kahfka's assassination of Mine two days earlier, so they had to be careful with their incursion.

They had definitely chosen the more dangerous of the targets Jacqueline had chosen, with the threats of not only the Jaegers and Night Raid, but with an entire hostile nation as well. And Jacqueline was well aware that she wasn't very well-liked he, considering she had executed a majority of the military and political leaders here in the capital before the population.

Within a pocket of Kahfka's trench coat rested a bottle of the same colorless and nigh-undetectable toxin Syura had used, only this version was exceptionally more powerful since they were going to be dealing with their sworn enemies.

"Kahfka, once we reach the center square, we'll have to stick the shadows a best as possible. There's not much cover there, and from what I can tell its crawling with enemies." whispered Jacqueline over her shoulder.

"Right. I'll stick close to your side." replied Kahfka.

They vaulted over the edge of a factory building and dove into a grouping of bushes when a patrol of Hellraisers soldiers walked past them. When they moved far enough away they darted out from the bush and sprinted down one of the many cobblestone walkways to some more shrubbery to wait out another patrol. They kept this pattern of waiting and then running from hiding spot to hiding spot going for a few more minutes, getting closer and closer to the Parliament Building.

Finally, after what seemed like hours of excruciating silence, they leaped up to the roof of the building with the assistance of some small ice platforms Kahfka created. Jacqueline used a bone shard to prop open a skylight and let Kahfka jump down first, the Great General looking around a few times before following her down.

She landed like a cat, making no sound whatsoever, and she crept with Kahfka down the hallway towards where she could sense a presence she could never forget. It took them a long time to find it, the large time lapse from entering to finding the correct room due to them wanting to make sure they weren't making a ruckus and being discovered.

Jacqueline looked at Kahfka and made the shushing motion with her index finger, Kahfka nodding before she etched up and grabbed the doorknob lightly. Jacqueline retrieved the bottle of toxin from the trench coat and, unlike Wild Hunt, they wore no masks to protect themselves from the toxin since Jacqueline had already built an immunity to it and with Kahka, the machines inside her body could easily filter out the toxin from the air and dispose of it accordingly along with the arson dioxide she releases upon exhaling.

On the count of three, Kahfka gently pushed in the door and Jacqueline placed the uncorked bottle just beyond the door frame. They closed the door and they waited for a few minutes to ensure the toxin took effect, and when the fifth minute passed by Kahfka opened the door again and they slowly stepped inside prepared for a fight.

Jacqueline sneered and withdrew the bone reds protruding from her hands back into her arms, the thought of a fight instantly leaving he mind when she saw what had become of the two people in the bed resting a few feet away from them.

Esdeath and Tatsumi, unfortunately, hadn't discovered that the toxin had been introduced into the air within the bedroom, so as a result they were both lying comatose underneath the sheets.

"Kahfka, bind his ankles and wrists." whispered Jacqueline as she walked around to one side of the bed in order to look down at her former superior.

While Kahfka created ice braces around Tatsumi's ankles and wrists after she pulled them together, using her power to levitate the ice around them and, by extension, the rest of his body out from under the sheets, Jacqueline leaned down until she was mere inches away from Esdeath's face and grinned.

"I'll be borrowing your husband, Esdeath. Sweet dreams." she whispered, Kahkfa tapping her on the shoulder when she had secured their target.

They left the room in the exact same way they had left it, with Jacqueline leaving behind a parting gift, she had called it, before they made their way out of the Parliamentary Building through the same way they had come in. And instead of trying to traverse the courtyard again, Kahfka formed shards of ice around her wrist and ankles and well as Jacqueline's so that they could fly out of the capital without leaving a trace.

"Flawless. Simply flawless." remarked Jacqueline as they flew over the edge of the capital and out over the rolling plains surrounding New Kannath.

"Now that we have him, just what exactly are you planning? Why do you need Esdeath's husband and that other guy from the Eastern Nation?"

"All of that will be revealed in due time, my dear. You'll just have to wait and see."

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

 **\- Seven Hours Later -**

Tatsumi awoke with a start and instantly he realized he wasn't in his soft bed resting next to his wife. He tried to pull himself up and the first discovery he made was that he was bound by his wrist and ankles to an operating table of some kind, and the second discovery he found was that he was still in his boxer shorts. He shivered from the cold touch of the metal bed on his skin and he looked around to try and get a grasp on his surroundings and the situation he was in.

There was light coming from some torches hung on the wall, and the room he was in was made entirely out of a dark-colored metal, most likely iron or steel with a paint coat, and that a few feet away from him to his right there was a heavy door sealed shut.

" _What in the hell…?_ " he wondered before a certain smell struck his nostrils and made his eyes shot wide open and caused chills to run up and down his spine.

The scent of blood was present in the air around him, and he started to freak out when memories and visions of his murdered best friends began to appear in his mind like a torrential downpour.

That's when the third and most terrifying realization struck him. He recognized the smell as the same one he had encountered upon coming here for the first time many months earlier. He was within a separate portion of the Reconditioning Department...otherwise known as the infamous Torture Chambers, where countless poor and unfortunate souls met their gruesome and painful deaths at the hands of torturers employed by the Prime Minister. And the first person that came to mind that he associated with the Torture Chambers was what made him wish that this was all just a nightmare and he would wake up next to Esdeath in a matter of moments.

Unfortunately for him...this was a fruitless hope. The sealed door let out a series of clicks and with a hiss opened inward, the one person he had never hoped to see again until the fall of the Empire walking in with a grin on her face.

"Oh...so you've finally woken up. Welcome back to the capital, Tatsumi." said Jacqueline as she closed the door to her personal quarters shut and locked it.

Tatsumi said nothing in return to the greeting and instead stared at her intensely with a expression filled with hate and rage.

"Don't give me that look. I'm not going to kill you. Relax." said Jacqueline in a calm voice while she strolled over to him and took out a key from her trench coat.

She unlocked the cuffs restraining Tatsumi's ankles, and when she unlocked his wrists he lashed out and grasped her throat tightly in attempt to choke and crush her windpipe

"I wouldn't do that...if I were you…" grunted Jacqueline with a smirk, Tatsumi raising an eyebrow in confusion before he felt something sharp touch the skin around his throat.

He reached up with his other hand and discovered that hanging around his neck was a ring made out of bone that couldn't be removed, and he quickly found out that it was Jacqueline's bone due to the fact that touching his neck from all sides were razor sharp spikes that, with a mere gesture, she could extend them out and cut deep into his throat in order to kill him instantly.

He growled in frustration and begrudgingly let go of Jacqueline, the Great General rubbing her throat as she returned the bone necklace around Tatsumi's throat back to its original smooth appearance.

"Why the hell did you bring me here? We're enemies, and if I didn't have this thing around my neck I would kill you."

"But of course, I would do the same thing. However...there's a more important reason why I brought you here."

Tatsumi was thrown, quite literally and metaphorically, for a loop when she pushed him back onto the table with enough force to jar his vision for a few seconds. When the flashing lights and dull ache in the back of his head went away for the most part, he was floored when he saw that Jacqueline had climbed up onto the operating table and was standing over him, her hands resting on either side of his head and her knees mere centimeters away from his hips.

"Why do you continue to be our enemy? she asked, the look on her face the only message Tatsumi needed to realize where this was going, especially since this had happened previously.

"Don't even think about trying to seduce me into joining you. I'm not going to abandon Esdeath and my friends." he growled.

Jacqueline giggled while she leaned back onto the haunches of her legs and changed her expression to a pouty look, saying, "Oh, you're no fun. But just think of all the things I can give you if you rejoin the Empire."

She fondled with the buttons of her trench coat and she unlatch end the first couple, revealing a large portion of her cleavage. Tatsumi gulped nervously and he cursed his own gender and the hormones that came along with it, the Great General noticing the slight change in his demeanor and pressing her advantage.

"I can do away with the charges and crimes on your head, and make you a General of the Empire in command of my army." she said as she traced her fingers lightly around the edge of Tatsumi's chin, her other hand continuing on down the line of buttons for her coat.

The more skin she revealed the redder the blush on Tatsumi's face got, and finally when she reached the final clasp, Jacqueline grinned as she rolled her shoulders so that the coat could fall off her shoulders. Tatsumi was treated to a full, in-restricted view of Jacqueline completely and utterly naked, and even though his brain told him not to, his eyes still looked over every single part of her body in order to take in every single detail.

He had to admit, for a brutal sadist and terrifying military leader, just like Esdeath, she was quite beautiful with the form of a goddess. Her hips and thighs were almost like they had been sculpted by a master craftsman, and her breasts were just as good as Maya's and Esdeath's. Jacqueline's own cheeks started to redden as he examined every inch of her and she leaned down, bringing her face within inches of his.

"If you stay with me...I can make you my Emperor…" she whispered before she closed the gap and kissed him, Tatsumi's shooting wide open I'm shock.

" _Dammit...Esdeath, I'm sorry. Until I can find a way out of here, I'm going to have to play along with this situation…_ " he thought to himself as Jacqueline pressed her naked body up against his, the heat and warmth from her transferring itself into him.

After she pulled away from him he asked, "What do you mean by that?"

Jacqueline leaned back and with a wink she started to turn herself of around, switching the position of her hands and knees so that her ass was hanging over Tatsumi, which he also found to be quite a sight to see.

"That's for me to know, and for you to find out later…" she stated with a lustful tone before she turned her head back and used her hands to pull down Tatsumi's boxers and let free his erect member.

To be honest she was left in a state of awe upon laying eyes of it, since for her this was the first time she had ever seen one.

" _So this is what it looks like…_ " she thought to herself as she gingerly touched it with her fingers.

She may have never seen one up until this point, but she sure wasn't an amateur when it came to knowing what would bring pleasure to him. With a heavy blush she stuck out her tongue and licked the tip of Tatsumi's cock, the Jaeger closing his eyes and letting out a deep breath at the sensation. She proceeded to lick it a couple of more times before she wrapped her lips around the head and took his entire length it at once.

She bypassed her gag reflex easily and began to move up and down, this newfound feeling she was experiencing at this very moment starting to turn her on and arouse her sexual desires. Tatsumi was finding it difficult to keep his own desires at bay as well, and the more Jacqueline sucked hungrily at his member, the line dividing their status as enemies soon began to blur and dissipate into nothingness.

Keeping ever-present in the back of his mind the real reason why he was allowing himself to do this, he snaked his arms under and around her thighs in order to grasp each of her ass cheeks and pull her down. Jacqueline gasped in a high-pitched tone when she felt Tatsumi's breath against her sex, and a few seconds later she had to stop herself and wait for her body to relax itself somewhat when he started to use his tongue.

After the initial shock passed by Jacqueline returned to sucking him off while she was pleasured from behind, the pair losing all sense of rationality and memory that they were in fact archenemies. After a few minutes of sharing their intimacy, the Great General was caught off guard when Tatsumi let out a stream of semen into her mouth, but instead of rearing back she closed her eyes and waited until he was finished before she pulled back and swallowed it all, the substance leaving behind a unique aftertaste that she found wasn't half bad.

"Enough of the foreplay…" she murmured as she removed herself from Tatsumi for a moment in order to turn herself back around and straddle his midsection.

She took his dick in her hand and sensually ran it gently across the folds of her entrance, Tatsumi eying her carefully with a heavy blush on his face that matched hers in color and volume. She giggled at him and said, "You should count yourself lucky...you get to have my first time. Kahfka is a wonderful partner...but, of course, she's unable to do something like this."

" _This is her first time having sex…? And is she talking about that other girl, the one with white hair?_ " thought Tatsumi before Jacqueline bent her knees a little more in order to push his dick past her folds and into her, a moan and sharp breath escaping from her lips at the unorthodox feeling.

She didn't stop moving down until their skin touched and Jacqueline had to pause for a moment to give her body some rest, since as she had stated this was in fact her first time.

"Oh god...this...this is amazing." she murmured out of pure ecstasy, the Great General looking down at Tatsumi after she had thrown her head back after the initial insertion. "I don't care if we're enemies right now. Let's just enjoy ourselves…"

Jacqueline picked her hands up off Tatsumi's bare chest and with a glint in her eye she grabbed onto his, placing them directly onto her breasts afterwards. Instantly his fingers were sucked into soft mounds of flesh when he squeezed them gently, his touch making Jacqueline bite her lip again and moan quietly.

"Do they feel good?" she asked while Tatsumi continued to fondle her breasts.

"They're actually really good...they're pretty big too."

"They can be all yours...all you have to do is join me." said Jacqueline, Tatsumi glaring at her and snorting.

"Like that'll happen."

"You'll change your mind. It's all a matter of time now."

Jacqueline began to move her hips up and down now that she had gotten accustomed to the feeling of Tatsumi's cock inside of her, the wet sounds of it sliding in and out of her the only sound shared between them. Tatsumi moved his hands from her breasts to her ass when she leaned down and wrapped her arms around his neck, her heavy breaths of lust and pleasure striking his neck.

She pressed her lips to his again and Tatsumi dug his fingers into her ass cheeks, a high-pitched moan echoing out from between their lips from the Great General.

"Mm, yes, harder...harder! Fuck me harder! Make me feel good!" she urged on into his ear after removing her lips from his, Tatsumi beginning to thrust with his own hips up into her sex, her juices coating his member making it easier for him.

While Tatsumi was basically going through the motions of something that he had already done many times before, for Jacqueline, this was beyond heavenly. Having her personal time with Kahfka was exceptional, and she loved every second of it, but now that she was experiencing what it felt like to have sex with someone of the opposite sex...the only way to describe the feeling was that it was intoxicating.

Jacqueline tightened her inner walls around his cock in order to draw out as much pleasure as possible until finally, when Tatsumi reached his climax, her body tensed up like she had been electrocuted as thick ropes of his semen shot up into her, even reaching all the way into her womb. A few seconds passed by before she removed herself from Tatsumi while letting out a heavy pleasure-filled sigh, her eyes locking onto his and a grin appearing on her face as she grabbed his wrist.

"Come with me...this isn't over yet."

 **\- Capital District Building No. 5, Scientific Research Department -**

In the absence of Anton since he had been killed, now that she had arrived at the capital, Dorothea had taken over his extensive private laboratory within the Scientific Research Department and was already conducting her own experiments. Unlike Anton, who was a true scientist, the tiny girl was an Alchemist who specialized in science dealing with the life of either humans or Danger Beasts, which was one of her specialties.

One of the reasons why she was brought back by Syura was because of her exceptional skill with alchemy, through which she gave herself various body modifications and extended her lifespan. And currently, with Kahfka at her side watching over her, she was overseeing the sedating and effective imprisonment of their newest "guest".

"So what exactly is this guy's Teigu that makes him so valuable to you?" asked Dorothea after securing the heavy iron restraints around Solomon's wrists, ankles and torso.

"His Teigu is named Vile Blood Curse, and with it he's essentially immortal since any limb or organ he loses he can regrow back good as new. He can even regenerate his entire body from a pool of his blood if he wants to." explained Kahfka as she pulled down a lever on a wall in order to lift up the bed the unconscious Jaeger was resting on.

She pushed it across the rails its chains were hanging off from into a secluded room filled with ice and they closed the door on him, trapping him within the room whose temperature was far below freezing.

"And why are we going through all this trouble to lock him away?"

"Vile Blood Curse is similar to Demon's Extract in that it gives him the ability to manifest fire at will, and with it he can easily encase his body in fire to melt his way through things. So if we lock him in a freezing environment such as in this room, he'll only have enough energy to just barely keep himself alive since inside that room its negative one hundred degrees, which is cold enough to kill a normal human by hypothermia within an hour." explained Kahfka after recalling the Teigu's page within the Teigu Log Book.

Dorothea shook her head at how crazy the measures they were taking to ensure Solomon would stay confined before they sealed the door and returned to the lab tables situated behind them. The alchemist picked up a relatively large vial filled with blood and swished it around for a few seconds before she poured its contents into a feeder connected by hose to the large glass stasis chamber built in the direct center of the room. The blood drifted up from the grate in the bottom of the tube as a misty cloud, and as soon as it mixed with the chemicals already present within the liquid a muscle-like tissue instantly began to form from the Phoenix blood.

"How long do you think it will take before enough has been created?" asked Kahfka of Dorothea as she made some final adjustments with a control panel to the right of the feeder tube.

"I don't know exactly, but for what the Great General wants, I'll work to get it done as soon as possible."

Kahfka nod her head in approval and she departed from the laboratory, her next destination being the defensive wall built around the city in order to oversee the activation of the final defensive measure Jacqueline had come with for the eventual arrival of their enemies. The idea behind it was pure genius in of itself, but what would come from it when it would actually be used was so devious that Kahfka couldn't help but smile and think of how their enemies would react.

" _And then...we can't forget about the cherry on top of it all. The one thing that can change the tide of this revolution in a heartbeat._ " she thought to herself while glancing back at the Imperial Palace after leaving the Scientific Research Department. " _The Supreme Teigu...reputed to be have enough power to wipe out anything that threatens the safety of the Empire._ "


	40. Carnage Incarnate

A/N Welp. Can't do much in that situation, I guess. But, ah, yeah...I wonder what the terrible duo and Dorothea are planning? Taking Solomon's blood and then the certain things they've constructed to help defend the Imperial capital...what is going on? And then there's the looming threat of the Supreme Teigu, the one we all know and hate from the anime/manga. Speaking of the manga, guys, Incursio got even more OP. I can't wait for the next chapter. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 39 - Carnage Incarnate**

 **\- New Kannath -**

 **\- The Next Day -**

The Jaegers and Night Raid, instead of waking up feeling rested and refreshed in their rooms within the Parliament Building, were actually cowering in fear just outside of the room that was given to Esdeath and Tatsumi due to the former waking up to find that her husband was nowhere to be found. And it didn't take her long to realize that they must've been sedated with some sort of gaseous compound that knocked them out and, while she was comatose, Tatsumi had been taken under the cover of darkness by the one person she knew would be able to do so.

Akame glanced at Wave with a worried expression on her face when they all heard something break inside the room, followed by another explosion of the former General's vicious killer intent they once used to fear when she was still their enemy.

"Now I remember why I was so afraid of her…" whispered Chelsea under her breath to Lubbock, who nod his head vigorously in agreement with the assassin.

Suddenly the noise inside the room stopped and when they heard footsteps coming their way everyone sprinted the opposite direction to try and get as far away from that spot as possible in order to avoid getting caught standing before the enraged Ice Queen.

When the doorknob turned and Esdeath walked out, the look on her face was so scary and filled with rage it would've made even Tyrant cower and quake in fear.

"Guys, you don't have to hide." she said aloud with a sigh, her eyes moving to look down one end of the hallway to the left while she put a hand on her hip.

A few moments passed by until the heads of Lubbock, Chelsea, Wave, Akame, Run and Maya peered out from around the corner. One by one they stepped back out into the hallway and Esdeath walked over to them, her innate anger getting put under wraps for the time being.

"So, I'm assuming that Tatsumi would've been taken to the Imperial Capital?" asked Wave while crossing his arms, Esdeath nodding with a slight growl.

"Yes. It pisses me off thinking that Jacqueline was able to do something like this…"

"Well then, it seems to me that we'll have to go after him." said Najenda when she joined the group from the other end of the hallway.

"And that's not all that's occurred. It seems our dear friend the Great General has also gotten away with kidnapping the Straelkan Princess' second-in-command." informed Arthur upon his appearance in the hallway, Run rubbing the bottom of his chin and frowning.

"So she got Solomon too...why do all of this? There has to be a reason why she kidnapped Tatsumi and Solomon, and the only reason why I can think she would take Solomon was for his blood."

They turned around when they heard the door to Leone's room open, and out walked the blonde herself with solemn and dejected look on her face. Her entire demeanor contrasted with her usual optimistic personality, and just a glance at her told them that there was something wrong with her.

"Leone, are you okay?" asked Najenda out of worry for her, since she had been the one to witness Mine's death and, to be frank, they were concerned with her mental health.

"You guys are gonna be going to the Imperial Capital to rescue Tatsumi and Solomon, right?"

"Yeah, are you coming?" asked Maya.

"No." replied Leone harshly with a scowl, which deeply surprised everyone there. "I'm not going."

"What?"

"You heard me, Najenda. I'm done, finished. After watching what happened to Mine...I...I can't do this anymore…" said Leone before she started to get flustered and, unable to take their stares any longer, she walked off without saying another word.

They couldn't really blame her, considering just how brutal and sudden Mine's death was. When Tatsumi, Esdeath and Run had returned to the building with Pumpkin and the grievously injured Leone, they were all struck in the heart with a burning hot stake upon learning of their friend's death. But they all knew that Leone had taken the worst blow of them all. The images of Mine's minuscule body getting instantly crushed would never leave her mind...she was going to be haunted by them forever, just like how Maya would never forget her parents and Tatsumi his friends.

"I will take care of her. You all must focus on getting your friends back. I wish you luck." said Arthur with a small salute before he jogged off after Leone.

Esdeath looked over at Najenda and they both nodded, the group diverging out to their own rooms to retrieve their individual Teigu while Esdeath made her way to the outside to prepare their mode of transportation. When they were all assembled outside, Esdeath snapped her fingers and created several ice horses from thin air, the steeds breathing out clouds of frost as they waited for their riders.

Esdeath gripped her rapier tightly after hoisting herself up onto her horse, Wave and Akame following suit with their Teigu at their sides. Akame, alongside Murasame, was also carrying Yatsufusa within its sheath not only out of respect and memory for her sister but so that if the need arises, she would attempt to use the sword in conjunction with her own. Run hopped up onto his horse next, then Maya, then Lubbock, and finally Chelsea was the last to mount her ride with Gaea Foundation strapped to her belt.

Najenda took her time in getting up onto her horse since, in her hands was something she hadn't held or touched in a very long time. She looked over Pumpkin's frame and ran a hand gingerly along its barrel, memories of her past life as a General in the Empire when she wielded the sniper rifle as her own passing through.

"You okay Najenda?" asked Lubbock as he maneuvered his ice horse over to hers, the Night Raid leader glancing up and smiling while shouldering the rifle.

"Yeah, I'm just...reminiscing is all."

When she climbed up onto her horse and strode over to be next to Esdeath, the two former Generals nodded at one another before Esdeath led them away from the Parliament Building towards the east. Jacqueline had made a grave mistake kidnapping Tatsumi...anyone who stood in the way of her rescuing him from whatever fate the Great General had in store for him was going to be slaughtered with extreme prejudice.

 **\- Capital District Building No. 23, Reconditioning Department -**

 **\- Two Days Later -**

The past two days for Tatsumi have been...interesting to say the least. Jacqueline was still trying to get him to switch sides back to the Empire and abandon his friends, but every time she posed the question to him he would always give her the same response and remained adamant that she wouldn't be able to change his mind. Not even having sex with him was enough to change his views, but she wasn't too worried since he couldn't try to leave even if he wanted to since she still had the bone collar around his neck that she could us to kill him at any moment.

So, in the end, he was confined to her personal quarters within the torture chambers where the only thing he could hear was the screams of the damned souls trapped there and the smell of blood from what was being done to them.

" _Well...it isn't so bad down here. At least she's bringing me food and she has a warm shower._ " he thought to himself before he managed a quick glance at Kahfka, who was sitting a few feet away from him reading a book titled _The Legend of Razgriz_. " _And I'm glad she hasn't tried to kill me yet or anything either._ "

Being among the Great General and her subordinate, which he found out very quickly that she was not only that but her lover and partner too, had given him a whole new perspective on their enemy. He was well aware that Jacqueline was basically a mirror copy of Esdeath before her personality changed for the better, only worse, and that Kahfka was the same story, but aside from these obviously aspects there was so much more to them.

In a sense, the relationship they had was almost exactly like the one he shared with Esdeath, with either of them holding such deep emotional ties to the other they would be willing to risk their lives for one another.

And there was another thing too...he didn't know what, but there was something that Jacqueline was hiding from him. The suspicions began when she had said "I'll make you my Emperor" before she had sex with him, and the more he thought about those words the more he wanted to know about just what the Great General had in store for him, the Revolution, and the Empire as a whole.

And a couple of times when he looked at Jacqueline's eyes, he always thought he could see some deep sense of pain inside of her from some unknown source. He remembered from the Inquisitor that he had taken care of her ever since she was young, which told him that she must've been an orphan at some point in her life, but other then that her past was shrouded in mystery to him.

" _I've got to figure it out somehow…_ " he thought in determination before he heard the shower turn off, telling him that Jacqueline had just finished up and was about to walk out.

By that time Kahfka had folded down the page she was at in her book and set it down on the side so that way she could take her turn when Jacqueline stepped out, the Great General doing just that a few seconds later. She had a towel pulled up to cover her wet and naked body since Tatsumi was in their presence, but as soon as Kahfka stepped past her into the shower room, which she had modified to include a changing room and sliding opaque glass door, Jacqueline tossed the towel away and wringed out the last few drops of water from her hair.

"Do you have to do that every time?" asked Tatsumi as he averted his eyes, Jacqueline looking over at him and grinning.

"You might as well get used to it, Tatsumi. I'm not letting you leave until you agree to join the Empire. Either that will happen…" she started to say before he felt the bone collar develop razor sharp points again around his throat. "Or I'll just have to kill you. But to be honest, I don't really like that second option, it's less interesting and fun."

"Well good for me…" muttered Tatsumi before the entire room rumbled, Jacqueline's expression morphing from one of amusement to dead seriousness.

"That aura…" she murmured under her breath, Tatsumi immediately recognizing it a second later and smirking. "Kahfka! We have some unwanted guests!"

"Already on it." she replied as she flew out of the shower room with her clothes back on.

They were about to leave the chamber before suddenly everything turned a dull color of blue and they froze in place, Tatsumi blinking a few times when he recognized what was happening and wondered why he wasn't affected. The door suddenly blew inward and in walked a drastically pissed of Esdeath, who immediately froze Jacqueline and Kahfka in thick blocks of ice before turning towards him and losing all sense of anger by smiling at him.

"Sorry it took me so long to get here, you wouldn't believe the travel fees." she joked as she approached him and the two hugged while the effects of Mahapadma lingered to give them some time.

"I'm just glad to see you again. Could you please break this damned collar off around my neck? It's gotten uncomfortable." said Tatsumi while pointing at the bone collar, Esdeath snapping her fingers and freezing it for him so that he could easily shatter the super-cold bone into pieces. "Alright, let's get out of here before those two wake up."

They quickly left the room just as her Trump Card's effects started to wear off, and when Kahfka blinked a few times within the block of ice Esdeath had trapped her in she snarled and broke herself out of it with brute strength. She kicked the one Jacqueline was in and shattered it easily, freeing the Great General so that they could both give chase after Esdeath and Tatsumi to prevent them from escaping.

"Damn, Esdeath! What the hell did you do out here?!" stammered Tatsumi once they emerged back out onto the streets of the capital, his wife grinning sheepishly as he took in all of the ice columns and broken buildings surrounding the immediate area as well as severely injured or killed Imperial soldiers and policemen.

"I got a little carried away, sorry."

"Don't apologize now, we just need to get out of here." he replied as he followed her down the street away from the Reconditioning Department, the former General snapping her fingers again and creating a large dragon made entirely of ice a few feet before them.

They leaped onto its back and they took to the skies just as Jacqueline and Kahfka sprinted out of the metal box of a building, the Great General watching them go while Kahfka prepared to shoot them out of the sky with several icicles.

"No, leave them be. You know of the plan, correct?" asked Jacqueline with a glare at Kahfka, who nodded her head slowly and sighed.

"I'll go find Syura."

Meanwhile Esdeath and Tatsumi had just flown over the capital's defensive wall, and he looked down to see that Najenda and the others had joined Esdeath as well and were following them on the ground with ice horses. Once they were far enough away from the Imperial Capital she lowered the dragon's altitude and glided down towards a clearing in a nearby forest where the others were waiting for them.

"Were you guys able to find Solomon?"

"Wait, Solomon got captured too?!" asked Tatsumi, Run nodding his head at him before crossing his arms and sighing out of frustration.

"No, we weren't. We checked as many areas that we could before we saw you guys and escaped." he said solemnly, Esdeath growling before she returned her gaze to Tatsumi and smiled.

"Well, at least we got one back."

"Yeah, thanks guys. It's good to be out of that place. Now let's get out of here before-"

Tatsumi was stopped mid sentence when a bright purple yin and yang symbol appeared underneath their feet and glowed brightly, with Najenda yelling at all of them to scatter the only thing that was said before they vanished. Tatsumi and Esdeath hit the ground hard and it took them a few seconds to pick themselves back up and realize they were in a completely different place, and that they were alone.

"Shit, whatever that was must've separated all of us from one another!" growled Tatsumi before he activated Tyrannus and summoned Neuntote into his grasp.

"We need to find the others fast!" said Esdeath quickly as they sprinted off in the direction of the closest person they could sense.

Meanwhile, back at their original location several miles away, Runf coughed as the dust settled around the clearing and revealed that he was the only one left there after that seal had vanished. Even worse was the fact that he wasn't alone.

"Good job separating them Syura! Now we can hunt them down one by one!" said Cosmia happily as she twirled a microphone around in her hand while Izou made a grunting noise.

Syura led them out from the cover of the forest out into the open to where Run could glare at them and clench his fists. The disks of Mastema levitating behind his shoulders reacted in response to his change in emotions, becoming rigidly still and emitting a soft blue glow in preparation for when he would summon the Teigu's glorious angel wings.

"Let's just finish this up and get back to the capital so that I can find more little angels." said Champ while licking his lips, Run's focus shifting to his and from his attire and overall demeanor he instantly recognized him.

"You...I know you…"

The clown raised an eyebrow as looked at Run in confusion as the Jaeger began to levitate, the tips of Mastema's wings poking out from their disks. "What are you talking about?"

"Did you happen to go to a town named Joyou…?" asked Run with a stare as hard as steel.

"Joyou? Oh yeah, I remember that place! I ended up massacring a bunch of kids there while drunk, but there were just so many of them...just remembering it makes me so happy." said Champ with a smile before he raised an eyebrow and pointed at Run accusingly. "Why the hell do you need to know?"

Run's lips slowly curled up into a devilish smile when, in the blink of an eye, Mastema's wings finished building themselves up and instantly became covered with a glowing blue aura and he was right on top of Champ a second later, the glowing wings flapping once to create a gale-force wind powerful enough to blow away the other members of Wild Hunt.

"Those children...I was their Teacher!" snarled Run before he wrapped Mastema's wings tightly around Champ's arms, and with fear and terror swimming in the clown's eyes Run forcibly ripped off his arms and flung them to the side.

Champ let out a shriek of agony as he dropped to his knees, blood gushing out from the wounds while Run merely looked down on him like a king would to a peasant. Without another word Run made one of the wings rear back and come around like a cleaver sword, slicing Champ's head clean off his shoulders and turning his body into a fountain of blood that merely slumped over itself and collapsed.

"Champie!" exclaimed Cosmina before she brought up her microphone, a Teigu by the name of Heavy Pressure, but before she could use it Run brought his hand up and fired several feather projectiles at her.

Izou opened his eyes and used his superior swordsmanship to deflect the feathers away and keep her safe from the threat they posed.

"You all have made a serious mistake challenging a Jaeger. I'm going to kill you all here." said Run darkly, the samurai and Cosmina glaring at him from across the clearing.

"Oh really?"

Mastema formed a protective barrier to shield Run when Syura suddenly appreared behind him to try and plant his feet into his back for a devastating kick, and when that failed the Jaeger glared at him and shook his head. "Yes... _really_."

in a split second Wave used the agility Mastema granted unto him no returned the kick back full-force, knocking back Syura so as to give him ample time to soar up into the sky far out of the reach of his enemies. He stopped midair and spread his angel wings out as far as they could before he swept them forward, unleashing a cascade of feather projectiles aimed directly at the Prime Minister's son. Syura gripped Shambhala tightly and teleported away to the other side of the clearing in order to avoid the attack, but he had no time to breath when Run locked onto him again and sent more feathers barreling his way.

" _I won't be able to turn the tide of battle in my favor as long as he remains out of my reach._ " he thought with a grunt after rolling away from the Jaeger's second volley. " _It seems I really will have to use my Teigu at its full potential."_

When the last feather struck the ground Syura slammed his palm down, his Teigu glowing bright yellow instead of purple. "Dimensional Formation One: Opening Gate!"

Run's eyes widened when several yellow glowing ethereal disks inscribed with the Yin and Yang symbol appeared in the air, Syura breathing in deeply through his nose for a fraction of a second before he bounded off the ground, a small crater forming from the force of the jump, up to the closest disk. He leaped from disk to disk, zipping around this way and that around Run in order to disorientated the Jaeger while he looked for an opening in his defenses.

" _There it is!_ " he thought as he zoomed at Run with his fist cocked back, the blonde seeing him just in time in order to spin to the left and shoot some feathers after Syura when he shot past.

He winced a little when they pierced his left arm through the tricep and he took a few moments to remove the feathers from his arm before resuming his strategy with a twist. Mid-flight, he closed his eyes and pressed the palm of his free hand against his chest, directly over his heart, and shouted, "Dimensional Formation Two: Limiting Gate!"

Almost instantly he felt a surge of power course through his system, his senses becoming sharper, his strength and agility shooting through the roof, and instead of the ethereal disks being solid, they became translucent and as soon as his feet struck the next one in his path, he teleported through it to a completely different one outside of Run's view. And unfortunately for the Jaeger, this proved to be a problem when Syura flew past his defenses on another attack run and landed a clean punch him, knocking him down a few feet out of the air and disorientating him for a few moments.

"God's Wings." said Run after he recovered his balance, the brightly glowing blue energy forming once again around Mastema just in time for Run to block Syura's next kick and stop him dead in his tracks.

He pushed back the Prime Minister's son, using the power granted by Mastema's Trump Card to swipe and beat at Syura to try and pummel him into submission. Syura sucked in a breath when one of the wings struck his raised arm and jarred his vision from the heavy blow, his mind racing to figure out his next course of action in a matter of milliseconds. When he found a break in Run's counterattack he clipped Shambhala to his belt and when on of Mastema's wings came around he used it as a springboard to propel himself backward out of immediate danger.

Run wasn't going to let him get away easily, so he launched another barrage of feather projectiles at him toget him back on his heels again. However, Syura grinned when he returned Shambhala to his hand and pressed a tiny button on its underside, a miniscule blade popping out from the Teigu after a series of clicks.

"Dimensional Formation Three: Pain's Gate." he murmured before plunging the blade into the palm of his other hand, the procurement of blood creating a chain reaction in conjunction with the technique.

The feathers fired at him were blown away by the resulting shockwave and Syura started to growl as the technique began to transform him even further, his eyes turning pasty white while his hair began to stand on end and the veins in his muscles bulged out from an increase in blood flow. He clenched his fingers into fists when steam began to be secreted from his skin, which if one were to actually touch they would quickly discover it was burning hot.

"Bring it!" exclaimed Syura before he threw his fist forward, a portal appearing a few feet away from Run and quickly surprising him when an ethereal projection of his arm and fist emerged from it, only instead of normal size it was about three times that.

His wings took the full brunt of the war, and he cursed when the Trump Card effects war off immediately afterwards, meaning any other attacks that he knew would follow could do serious harm to him if he didn't avoid them. Another portal appeared next to him and he barely avoid the fist that emerged, the thumb just barely grazing by his right shoulder.

"You can't dodge my attacks forever!" yelled Syura as he leaped off the disk he was resting on an entered the threw another series of punches, putting Run on the defensive when the enteral copies surrounded him on all sides.

Just when it seemed like he would escape unscathed Syura entered the fray himself and kicked Run right in the back of his left shoulder, the Jaeger gasping when he felt several bones break in his arm. He lost some more altitude, and upon seeing this Izou crouched down and leaped into the air with a hand gripped tightly around his katana. Run saw the samurai out of the corner of his eye and instinctively he let loose a cloud of feathers to hopefully keep him at bay, but Izou skillfully swung and hacked his way through the barrage with elegant skill and before he knew it, the samurai was right on top of Run. Thinking on the fly and threw himself to the left and allowed for Izou to chop of his broken right arm, Run sucking in a breath at the loss of his limb to keep himself from crying out in anguish.

"Good job Izou, I'll finish him off here!" said Syura with a grin as he stared at Run, who had finally leveled himself out in the air, albeit he himself was hunched over with a tired expression on his face.

Blood from his severed arm had stained the right side of his clothes, but at least now he didn't have to worry about a broken arm slowing him down. He wiped some blood away from his lips and clenched his jaw muscles, narrowing his eyes at Syura while trying to figure out what his next move would be. The two combatants stared at one another intensely, and after a few seconds of silence Syura propelled off the ethereal disk he was on and commenced the attack on Run once again, the Jaeger activating Mastema's Trump Card again in order to combat the man's increased physical strength.

They exchanged furious blows, with Run adding in feather projectile strikes whenever he could to put Syura on his toes so that he could use his wings to try and beat him into submission, but thanks to Shambhala and its teleporting ability, the Prime Minister's son slowly began to gain an advantage over the Jaeger and hammer away at him. He slammed his fists into one of Mastema's wings and grinned when he saw some of the blue energy cloaking it falter and disintegrate, which in turn made struggle to keep the Trump Card active.

" _This ends now_." thought Syura as he his right arm back and pressed Shambhala itself against his chest, pressed so hard that he could feel his heart beat through the device. " _Final Dimensional Formation: Death's Gate._ "

The technique's activation created an explosive release of power that completely blew away Run and actually paralyzed him, which gave Syura plenty of time to rush him and deliver his most powerful attack yet. His fist rammed deep into Run's left shoulder and out through his back, the fountain of blood shooting out from the exit wound signaling the end of Run's ability to effectively use his arm and limit him even further. To follow up, Syura kicked Run directly in the gut and shattered almost all of his ribs, which as a result threw him back to ththe ground with such force his body made a crater on impact.

He coughed and hacked vigorously as Mastema's himself wings returned to the disks they originated from, Cosmina grinning happily as she walked up behind him and raised Heavy Pressure to her lips when he pulled himself up onto his knees. Every fiber of his being was screaming at him from the agonizing pain, so much so he could hardly move anymore. This was it, and he knew it. He wasn't going to live through this, so before the inevitable meeting with death came around, he took a few moments to look to the past and remember a time from long ago.

" _My students...I wish you all would've never been killed. To see your smiling faces everyday was my greatest treasure...if only things could've turned out differently..."_

"Run! Are you okay?!"

The Jaeger raised his head up and glanced back over his shoulder when, just before Cosmina put the final nail on his coffin, Wave and Akame emerged from the trees just across from them. Wave stopped in his tracks and his eyes widened in shock and horror, Run smiling at him for the final time before Cosmia broadcasted her voice and sent out several ultrasonic waves that consumed Run's body and crushed every single bone in his body, blood exploding out from his mouth as the bone fragments pierced all of his internal organs and added insult to injury.

Wave stood as still as a stone and watched Run's lifeless body fall onto its side in a pool of blood, Mastema's wings retracting themselves back into the two disks and hitting the dirt next to him. Akame drew Murasame and sprinted at the singer girl, forcing her and Izou to retreat while Wave remained rooted to the spot, his eyes unable to remove themselves from him.

"Run...why…?" he asked to no one in particular, Akame turning her head to stare at him with a worried expression while Syura, Izou and Cosmina retreated to the other side of the clearing to wait and see what would happen for the time being.

"First it was Bols, and then Kurome...and now Run?" asked Wave as tears began to appear in the corner of his eyes. "Why must all of my friends keep dying! Why can't I do anything to save them?!"

Instantly something snapped inside of his mind and he fixed his wide-eyed stare on Wild Hunt, his heartbeat the only sound that could be registered in the dead silence. "I'm going to kill you…"

Wave grabbed Grand Chariot's key from its sheath and stabbed the cutlass into the dirt at his feet, the tears in his eyes streaming down his cheeks as a ring of blue fire raging with the sorrow and anger he was feeling right now erupted around him.

"I'm going to kill each and every last one of you!" he roared, his emotions kicking aside his rationality and taking full control of his body.

Akame held her arm up to shield her eyes from the dirt kicked up by the shockwave of Wave summoning Grand Chariot, but after they adjusted to the change in air she noticed that their was something wrong...very, _very_ wrong. The blue flames started to become darker and darker, and Wave had started to hunch over and hold his head in his free hand as if he were in enormous pain.

He let out another cry and near the end his voice drastically changed and became more like a savage and guttural snarl of a beast then a human, and within seconds Akame became terrified for her own safety when the visage of Grand Chariot appeared behind him and instead of crossing its arms, it slammed its hands down onto the ground like how Tyrant would when Tatsumi summoned Tyrannus.

"Wave? Wave?!" she shouted above the wind, but her cry fell on deaf ears.

Grand Chariot let out a heavy groan and before their very eyes, cracks and chinks began to appear in its armor, the face shield covering its face breaking away when something inside of the armor started to break free. A portion of its helmet broke away and Akame gasped when a brightly glowing eye with a cross-slit pupil stared at her, with more of the face inside being revealed as Grand Chariot continued to break and shatter to unveil a terrifying beast that resembled a dragon.

All of a sudden the visage arched back and let out an ear-piercing shriek, the last few pieces of the armor breaking away and revealing the Danger Beast Tyrant himself with its massive wings opening up from their folded-up position on its back. That's when Wave started to transform as well, and what Akame could see happening sent chills running up and down her spine. Scales began to form underneath Wave's eyes and a pair of horns sprouted out from his forehead, his appearance beginning to take on that of a dragon's with razor sharp and jagged teeth and clawed hands.

Then Grand Chariot itself began to cover his body starting from the feet and rising up his legs, the original look of the armor now morphing into a more draconian one similar to Tyrannus in that he had clawed feet instead of boots, a long black tail sprouting out from his lower back, and segmented armor plates. When the helmet formed it completed its similarity to Tatsumi's Teigu by manifesting two long horns that curved upward and ended in points and a smaller pair jutting up just above his eyes. The iconic phantasmagoric defensive film that came with Grand Chariot manifested itself behind Wave's shoulders and completed his transformation, his eyes opening themselves up to reveal that within his black cross-slit pupils a red secondary pupil had emerged, giving him an even closer resemblance to a demonic dragon.

What had just occurred was something thought inimaginable. Coupled with Wave's unstable emotions and his desire to kill Wild Hunt, upon summoning Grand Chariot he was somehow able to break the limiter set onto Grand Chariot to prevent it from evolving, and in doing so, the armor let out such an influx of stored power that it consumed Wave and twisted his mind and body into that of the dragon's whom his Teigu was forged from.

The fire and visage of Tyrant dissipated and Wave remained perfectly still, his fists still clenched and his eyes set on Syura and Wild Hunt. A second later he opened his right hand and within it manifested an outrageously massive spear with a huge blade reminiscent of Neuntote.

Akame was afraid to speak lest she earned herself the ire of the volatile Wave, but before she could muster up her courage to speak up, Wave vanished. Cosmina's eyes shot wide open in shock and she coughed, Wave staring deep into her eyes with enough hate to burn holes through them as he stood a few inches away from her with his spear stabbed through abdomen.

With a snarl he ripped it out through her side and proceeded to literally cut her to pieces, turning her into a pile of bloody flesh at his feet while Syura, Izou and Akame watched in horror. Once he was finished with Cosmina, Wave turned his gaze to Izou and, just like with her, the samurai was unable to stop the enraged Jaeger from absolutely slaughtering him.

"Y-You bastard!" stuttered Syura frantically as he reared back and attempted to punch Wave in the jaw after he dropped Izou's severed head onto his corpse.

Wave merely brought a hand up and caught the fist in his own, and with the squeeze of his fingers Syura let out a cry of pain as he felt every single finger and bone in his hand break from the intense grip. Wave pushed his arm back and forced Syura to his knees, the Prime Minister's son looking up at him with a terrified expression and begging and pleading with the Jaeger to not kill him. However, Wave heard nothing from the man and with his spear he brought it up and cut down through Syura's body from the top of his skull all the way down to his crotch, completely bifurcating him into two equal halves and killing him.

He looked at the corpse of Syura for a few moments before his eyes widened and he dropped his spear as his hands grappled to his head, his eyes clenching shut when a sharp pain began to come from his head again. Another savage roar emerged from his lips and Akame tried to get closer to Wave, but she stopped herself when Wave's back suddenly bulged, Grand Chariot's armor cracking and splitting apart again.

"Wave? Wave what's happening?!" she asked, now fearing for his life when he lurched forward onto his hands and knees, his dragon tail whipping back and forth as his body started to bulge and grow.

In a few moments Akame started to slowly step back in horror when Wave started to transform again and grow larger and larger, Grand Chariot's armor melting away and morphing into actual skin and scales as the Jaeger lost all of his humanity and became what could be considered man's worst nightmare. Wave's arms grew to become massively buff with scales covering their entirety all the way down to his clawed hands, and from his back sprouted two massive leathery wings that blotted out the sun with their size. His jaw elongated and grew even more teeth while he gained a second pair of eyes and grew a series of horns out from his head when all of his hair vanished.

When it was completed, Wave set his hands deep into the earth and towered over the forest, his dragon body now fully finished. He had literally turned into Tyrant himself, with the only distinction between the actual Danger Beast and Wave being the navy blue that substituted the areas that would've normally been dark maroon as well as his eyes.

"Wave…" murmured Akame before she covered her ears when Wave reared his head back and let out a guttural roar that shook the earth down to its core and let anyone else in the immediate area know of just what kind of monster had been created.

Thankfully that worked out for Akame when Tatsumi, Esdeath, Najenda and the others appeared from behind her and became equally shocked at the situation presented before them.

"What the hell happened here?!" stammered Lubbock as he looked up at what he assumed to be Wave.

"We came here just as Run was killed by these people from the Empire and Wave just, he...he summoned Grand Chariot and...and it, I don't know, he evolved it." replied Akame in a shaky tone, Tatsumi and Maya's eyes shooting wide open when they heard Grand Chariot be paired with the word "evolve".

"That's impossible! Grand Chariot can't evolve!" remarked Tatsumi in disbelief, but even he challenged his own claimed after looking back up at the dragon and sensed that Wave was indeed the creature.

What worried him was that his presence of aura was very weak and surrounded by one that seemed almost demonic, the essence of a savage beast that he remembered feeling upon encountering Tyrant for the first time.

"And after Grand Chariot evolved and he killed those people, he transformed into this dragon?" inquired Esdeath as she tightened her fingers' grip around her rapier.

When she saw Akame nod her head she glanced at Tatsumi and Maya, the two thinking the same thing as her when they each summoned their auxiliary armaments and prepared to take on Wave. There was no use trying to talk to him in this state, so they only way they could save their friend from hurting himself was to defeat him without causing too much bodily injury.

"Chelsea, have Solomon's blood ready once we knock Wave out. Najenda, you're on sniper support. Lubbock, be ready to use your Realm-Cutting Threads to restrict Wave's movements for as long as possible if the need arises. Got it?" ordered Esdeath quickly while her General's instincts took control, Tatsumi and Maya stepping forward to stand on either side of her while Najenda retreated back with Lubbock while she withdrew Pumpkin and grinned.

"Try not to get yourself hurt." she replied back, Esdeath glancing back at her with her trademark grin and laughing.

"Wave! If you can hear us, we're gonna get you back to your normal self! Just hang on!" bellowed Tatsumi before the three of them leaped up into the air, the beastial Wave noticing them and roaring angrilly at their appearance.

He swiped at Maya with one of his hands and she vaulted herself over it, her fist cocked back when she flew up at his face and rammed her armored knuckles straight into his jaw. He stumbled back from the force of the blow, but he quickly recovered and sucked in a huge amount of air in order to spit out a steady and large stream of fire at her. The flames were suddenly stopped upon hitting the ethereal barrier Tatsumi created, and with a growl of frustration Wave reared back on his hind legs and used brute force to push through and attack them with his teeth.

Maya just barely avoided his jaw as it clamped shut around the space of air she had previously been in, and Wave was about to try again before he felt a powerful aura above him and he looked up just in time to have his face smashed in by a gigantic ball of ice Esdeath had created above him.

"Nice one!" exclaimed Tatsumi as he leaped off of the ice platform she had created in the air and went in to commence his own attack on their friend.

After Wave pushed off the ice ball and opened his eyes, he was immediately punched again in the jaw by Tatsumi several times, but thanks to his scaly armor he resisted the blows and countered by flapping his wings to create a wind powerful enough to blow back Tatsumi and Maya. When they landed on separate ice platforms Wave let out another stream of fire that was large enough to consume both of them.

"Grauhorn!" exclaimed Esdeath as she slapped her hands to the surface of her platform, a huge pillar of ice shooting out from its base and socking Wave in the jaw from above with enough force to shut his jaws up and cut off the fire before it could reach her allies.

"Snap out of it Wave! This isn't you!" she called out when she leaped off the ice platform and drove her heels deep into the top of Wave's head, further disorientating him and giving Maya and Tatsumi enough time to recover and start sprinting up his arms.

"Life Taker - Judecca Rising!" announced Maya, her armor taking on its Trump Card form when she passed the halfway point of Wave's arm and bounded off one of his muscles to go straight for the side of his head.

"This is gonna hurt me more then it will you, hopefully!" she said with a grunt before ramming her fist up into his lower jaw.

The blow threw his head back as well as the rest of his body, their draconian friend falling down onto his back with a heavy crash and ceasing all movement. Tatsumi, Maya and Esdeath all landed on the ground together and watched with wary gazes as Wave began to disintegrate into fire, his form becoming smaller and smaller until the fire totally vanished and revealed his comatose normal self. They approached him cautiously and Tatsumi was appalled to see the horns and scales covering his friend's body, the rest of the group walking over to see just how far Wave's humanity had been degraded.

"My god…" murmured Chelsea while covering her open mouth with a hand.

"You said Grand Chariot evolved, right Akame?" asked Tatsumi when Imperator disappeared, the assassin slowly nodding her head.

"Well, if what you say is true, and he watched Run die, as well as knowing that his other friends, namely Bols and your sister...the only way I can say how is that his volatile emotions actually broke the limiter built into Grand Chariot that kept it from evolving." explained Tatsumi as he crossed his arms, Maya taking a knee next to Wave and lightly touching the scales on his face to check if they were actually real.

"I suggest we get out of here as fast as possible. There's no way Jacqueline would've been unable to see Wave like that." said Najenda sternly, the group agreeing simultaneously without a second thought.

Tatsumi picked up his friend and Maya walked over to Run's body, taking a deep breath once before she covered herself in Imperator to avoid getting any blood on herself and clothes, and ran off with the others to avoid getting caught again by any pursuers.

They were right to leave when they did, since no more then a minute later the Great General herself and Kahfka arrived at the clearing and bore witness to the carnage left behind by Wave in his enraged state. Jacqueline smirked a little when she saw the look of shock painted on each half of Syura's face and she sighed, Kahfka forming an ice horse and hopping onto its back to give chase as soon as Jacqueline gave the order.

"Who do you want me to kill? Just say the word, and I'll go." she asked, the Great General glancing up at her and chuckling at her eagerness.

Surprisingly she leaped up to seat behind her on the ice creation and said, "We're both going. And make this horse into something a little bit bigger. I have an idea."


	41. Promise for the Future

A/N First things first, I'm going to say this. Run's death last chapter was utter and complete shit. So...I updated that chapter with new content to make it better. So before reading this, go back to Chapter 39 and read it to see what I changed. Moving forward, I've been wanting to do that with Grand Chariot for SUCH a long time now. I always believed that something like that could happen if the right things occurred, and yes, unfortunately Run had to die, but damn, Wave went absolutely beserk! He basically turned into what is happening to Tatsumi currently in the Manga, sorry spoilers, only more badass in that he literally turned into Tyrant. Speaking of Grand Chariot, I updated the page for it on **FanFicCollective** with its new appearance. Go check it out. But I digress, let's get back to the action. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 40 - Promise for the Future**

"Shit, they're right on our tail!"

"Keep running!"

Tatsumi and Esdeath led the pack as they ran through the trees as fast as they could, since above them in the sky were Jacqueline and Kahfka flying on a dragon made of ice, and they sure as hell weren't up there to sight-see. They hadn't realized how far they had travelled until they shot it f the forest and had to put on the brakes to avoid from falling down into a deep gorge with Rapids at its bottom.

Before Esdeath could create an ice bridge for them to cross or for them to just skip that entirely and jump to the other side, Kahfka suddenly dropped down a few yards behind them and slapped her palms to the ground, Najenda and Lubbock instinctively ducking to the side with everyone else as a massive wave of ice rushed at them. Unfortunately Tatsumi, Esdeath, Maya, Chelsea and Akame were caught by the ice and sent plummeting straight down into the roaring Rapids below, the strong current immediately overwhelming their own strength and carrying them off downstream without much trouble.

"Guys! Fuck!" yelled Lubbock as he watched them vanish underneath the water, Najenda tapping him on the shoulder t bring his attention back to their attacker and Jacqueline when she landed next to Kahfka.

They looked back and thought about jumping down after them to escape them, but with the flick of her wrist Kahfka eliminated that idea by freezing the entirety of the gorge up with ice to prevent them from doing so.

"Not a chance." she mocked with a chuckle, Najenda growling at her while she brought Pumpkin up towards them.

"So you're the former General Najenda. It's a pleasure to finally meet you after all this time. And I'm sure you already know of Kahfka here?" said Jacqueline, her grin pissing off Lubbock to the point he took a step in front of Najenda and clenched his fists.

"And you're that bitch who's been fucking around with us all this time, right?" he countered with a grin of his own, the insult not phasing Jacqueline but definitely irked Kahfka a little when she narrowed her eyes.

"Petty words like those won't hurt me. But I digress, I have a schedule to keep, so could we make this quick?" asked Jacqueline while removing Basilisk from her belt and uncurling the weapon into its blade form before glaring at Najenda, Kahfka making the same death stare at Lubbock.

 **\- Downstream -**

 **\- Three Minutes Later -**

"Shit..! We have to-" yelled Tatsumi before he was submerged under the after again, his head striking a rock underneath the waves and knocking him around a few times before he was able to bring himself back up from its depths.

"Esdeath!"

"Tatsumi?!"

He spotted her a few feet away from her and he used all of his strength to propel himself towards her so he could wrap an arm around her waist and tuck her up against his chest. She coughed out some water and after making sure she wasn't injured, Tatsumi formed Neuntote in his hand above the water and spotted a bunching of large rocks over to his right.

"Hold on to me!" he said, Esdeath tightening her grip around his midsection as he plunged the spear into a crack in between the rocks and stopped them from advancing any further down the river.

"Can you freeze the river to make sure no one else gets drawn away?"

"I'm on it." replied Esdeath after he helped her up onti the rocks so that she could properly focus herself to use Demon's Extract.

She placed her hand back on the water and within a matter of seconds she froze the entire river into a solid chunk of ice, luckily stopping their friends that were further down stream by encasing them inside. Once the technique had been completed Tatsumi broke himself out of the ice and went with Esdeath to help Chelsea out first, then Maya, who was still holding onto Run's corpse, and then finally Akame with the unconscious Wave held in her arms.

"Thank god you were able to do that. I think I was about to throw up from all that tumbling…" mumbled Chelsea as she turned a little green in the face and hunched over to try and keep herself from vomiting.

"There's no time to rest, we need to get back and help Najenda and Lubbock. Come on!" exclaimed Tatsumi before he vaulted himself up out off the gorge, Esdeath right behind him.

Maya held a hand to Chelsea and when she took it she leaped after them, Run's body still slung over her shoulder. Once they touched ground she offered to carry Wave so Chelsea wouldn't be burdened with him and she thanked her, Tatsumi and Esdeath waiting half a second for them to catch up before sprinted back the way they came to try and save Najenda and Lubbock.

Unfortunately for them...another curveball had been thrown by fate and there was no way to avoid it.

 **\- Cliff Edge -**

"Die!"

"Lubbock!" bellowed Najenda as she brought up Pumpkin and obliterated the bone shard lobbed at him like a javelin, the act bringing a devilish smile to Jacqueline's face when the final piece fell into place.

Najenda suddenly felt a sharp pain in her lower back and coughed, a trickle of blood emerging from the corner of her mouth. Kahfka sneered as she pushed the icicle deeper through her back right past her spinal cord, its sharpened tip protruding out of her stomach.

" _Got_ you." whispered Kahfka into her ear as she twisted the icicle around to inflict more pain unto Najenda, the former General coughing again.

Kahfka then brought around her other arm and stabbed a second icicle through the direct center of her chest, Lubbock turning around when she let out a whimper and staring at her with horror painted on his face. Kahfka waited for a few seconds to make sure the pikes were imbedded into her skin before letting go of Najenda and kicking her forward right into Lubbock's arm, the assassin dropping to his knees while she slumped against his shoulder.

He didn't even have time to say anything before Jacqueline grabbed him by the back of the throat and lifted him into the air, the serrated blade of Basilisk wrapping itself around his waist tightly. With a sharp tug Jacqueline wrung the bone sword around him and tore through his clothes, ripping apart his skin and turning the flesh underneath into a tangled mess of blood and tattered fabric.

"Nighty night." said Jacqueline as she dropped Lubbock and, with a quick fluid swipe, she severed one of his legs at just above the knee and splattered his blood across the grass to his right.

Lubbock yelled out in pain as he curled up and gripped his thigh, Jacqueline savoring in the pain and anguish he was experiencing for a few moments before she motioned to Kahfka for them to get a move on.

They quickly left the area when Kahfka created two ice horses for them to ride on, the two leaving Lubbock and Najenda to die from their injuries. Thankfully, the former grunted and managed to pull himself up onto his remaining knee and dragged himself over to Najenda, who wasn't moving whatsoever.

He reached her side and huffed as he rolled her over and felt his heart tighten up at the sorry state she was in, with blood caking her chin, chest and abdomen from the icicle shoved in between her collarbones as well as her stomach.

"L-Lubbock…" murmured Najenda in a weak voice.

"Najenda, you gotta stay awake. Just keep your eyes open until the there come back with Solomon's Phoenix Blood." urged Lubbock as he pushed aside some strands of her hair out of her face.

"I...It feels cold…"

"Please don't die on me Najenda, you're still needed!" pleaded Lubbock before he cringed at the intense feeling of pain in his gut from the wound he sustained from Basilisk.

As he struggled with himself to try and not cry, he felt a hand gently touch his cheek and he opened his eyes to see Najenda smiling up at him. "Lubbock...how long have you had feelings for me?"

Lubbock was caught off guard by the sudden question, and he was unsure of what to say at first since his brain was still processing her words. After a few seconds of silence he chuckled nervously and grinned, "Hehe, um...you've known?"

"It's kind of hard not to notice." replied Najenda before breaking out into a small fit of coughing. "Lubbock, listen to me...there's something I want you to do…"

Several minutes passed by until Tatsumi and Esdeath arrived with Maya and Chelsea, and what they came to was a scene that neither of them wanted to see. Lubbock was just barely keeping himself awake, with the injuries he sustained rating out every last ounce of his energy, and intertwined with the fingers of his right hand were those of Najenda's left hand. They were both exceptionally weak and were on the verge of death, which was infinitely better then arriving way too late.

"Chelsea, we have to give them some Phoenix Blood now!" said Tatsumi, but when Chelsea reached for the satchel that contained the vials of miracle blood, she quickly discovered that she no longer had it.

Quickly her heart sank into the pit of her stomach a well as Tatsumi's and Maya's upon realizing that when they had been flung down into the river earlier, during the chaos of tumbling and turning in the current, the satchel had come loose from her grasp and had gotten lost in the water.

They were now without the one thing that gave them an edge against the sadistic Great General and her subordinate. And now with Lubbock and Najenda on the verge of death, Tatsumi relied on his gut instinct and without a word he jogged over to his friends, hoisted Lubbock up in one arm and held Najenda in his other and motioned with his head towards the southeast.

"Come on, let's get to the Shisuikan. I heard from Jacqueline while I was there in the Empire that the fortress had been taken over by Straelka. There's no time to lose!" he exclaimed over his shoulder as he sprinted away, Esdeath, Maya and Chelsea following suite.

 **\- Fortress Shisuikan -**

 **\- One Hour Later -**

"Princess! There are visitors at the gate!"

"Who are they?" demanded Camilla, who was still in quite the pissed off mood due to Solomon's kidnapping. "Are they friendly?"

"I recognize Esdeath among them, as well as Tatsumi!"

Immediately Camilla rushed out of the high-tower office she had taken up residence in and flew down the stairs towards the ground level, her previous feelings of anger and rage getting replaced with the excitement that came with the thought of seeing her friends after so long.

However, upon arriving at the gate after she ordered her men to open it and seeing Tatsumi carrying a barely alive Lubbock over one shoulder and Najenda over the other, with Maya carrying Run and Wave in a similar fashion, she quickly took them to the fortress infirmary where she had the medics and doctors her army had brought with them from Straelka get to work on putting Lubbock and Najenda on life support.

After several hours passed and it seemed that he was finally in a more or less stable condition, Camilla met with everyone outside the infirmary and heard from Tatsumi the whole story of what had occurred since their last meeting.

"They...they're all dead?" asked Camilla, referring to Run, Mine and Kurome, Tatsumi solemnly nodding his head to confirm the terrible truth.

"And I'm guessing you guys couldn't find Solomon?"

"Don't ask me, I got kidnapped too."

"What? Really?"

Tatsumi crossed his arms and growled a little in bitterness, saying, "Yeah, I was. Esdeath and the others came and rescued me though, and that's when we encountered the Prime Minister's son and some cronies of his."

He stopped himself and cleared his throat. "Actually, it was Run who fought them first, and then Wave and Akame arrived just at the exact moment he was killed. And according to Akame, he somehow was able to evolve Grand Chariot even though it was never designed to do so, in order to protect the user from the threat of forcefully evolving the armor like Tyrannus when it was first made."

Camilla shook her head and sighed heavily, pushing herself off the wall she was leaning on and walking over to him in order to hug him. Tatsumi was surprised at first but he accepted the hug without question, the empathy the Princess was showing him enough to soothe his soul for the time being.

"Any word on Lubbock, Najenda and Wave?" asked Chelsea when she walked over with Maya and Esdeath after they had dropped off Run's body to be properly taken care of.

"Nothing on the first two, but Wave is doing fine. Akame is looking over him right now." replied Camilla.

"What about those draconian features he developed?"

"That is a more difficult matter."

A doctor walked out from the infirmary building with a unique looking pair of gloves on his hands, Tatsumi and Esdeath recognizing them as the Teigu Perfector that used to be owned by the late Dr. Stylish. He removed them and placed the pair of globes in his white coat's left pocket and let out a heavy sigh, his whole demeanor giving a clue to them that the condition with Wave was worse then it seemed.

"As I suspected upon seeing your friend, he has indeed broken the limiting device put into Grand Chariot that negated the possibility of the armor evolving through sheer willpower alone, which is a feat in of itself." explained the doctor with a stone-cold gaze. "As a result, upon breaking it, all of the stored up power that Grand Chariot accumulated over the many years of its use was released all at once and enabled it to evolve according to your friend's desire to kill your enemies, which in turn transformed it into a more demonic and dark appearance that differed drastically from its original one."

"So what are you saying? Is Wave going to die or something?" asked Tatsumi, the doctor noticing his eyes and immediately returning Perfector to his hands in order to scan him with the gloves.

"I can see that you fused yourself with your Teigu. Young man, did you also fuse yourself with the Danger Beast that lived on within Tyrannus?"

"Yes, and his name was Tyrant. He willingly fused his body and power with me, so I became a Human and Danger Beast hybrid as a result." said Tatsumi, the man nodding once before he did the same scanning procedure on Maya.

After returning the gloves to their pockets he crossed his arms and sighed, saying, "Then it is as I feared. Allow me to inform you on a little tidbit of history that none of you probably knew about your Armors."

"What do you mean?" asked Maya in a worried tone, the doctor fixing her gaze on her and adjusting his glasses.

"When Tyrant's flesh was divided out to create Tyrannus, Grand Chariot, and Imperator, an unseen side-effect was that his existence was split apart into three pieces, with one going into each of the Teigu. Each have their own mind and will, and they have no memory of their other portions as well. The one within Tyrannus fused itself with its user and is effectively dead, and from my scans the portion within Imperator has been subjugated and poses no threat to you, Miss." he continued while motioning to Maya with his head.

"Okay, so what about the portion of Tyrant within Grand Chariot? What's happened to it?" questioned Chelsea of the doctor, the man looking at her and closing his eyes.

"As a result of your friend breaking the limiting device and activating a forced evolution, whether he is consumed by the armor or it fuses with him...he is becoming Grand Chariot's Dragon Body." stated the doctor in an ominous tone, his listeners showcasing their surprise with a collection of gasps and or expressions of horror.

"And is that good…? Will it end up like what happened with Tatsumi?" asked Esdeath, the doctor shaking his head.

"Do not mistake this for a power up in the least. Rather, believe me when I say that it will break him. Wave wished for power to kill those who killed our friend, and he certainly got it, but this had put him in quite the precarious situation. After maybe a couple of years and continuous training, he may be able to control Grand Chariot as it is now without any problems arising."

"And if he continues to use it…?"

"Having evolved in such a dangerous way, your friend might be completely devoured by Grand Chariot…and due to the abnormally high amount of power released by the armor upon its evolution, his body might not be able to endure it and then he'll be consumed and destroyed. In other words...your friend will die."

The doctor's imposing statement drew a veil of terror over the group as they took in the truth of their friend's condition. Tatsumi had to support himself on the wall since he had lost all feeling in his legs, the very thought of Grand Chariot consuming Wave and killing him sending a burning hot stake through his chest.

"With that out of the way, I'd like to tell you of the condition of your other friends." said the doctor after clearing his throat to draw their attention back to him.

"Lubbock has finally reached a more or less stable condition, and I believe he will be able to pull through, although it will take a long time for him to recover, at least several months especially since we'll have to give him a prosthetic leg."

"Thank god…" murmured Chelsea with a sigh of relief, Tatsumi doing the same, but their moment of thankfulness was quickly shut down by the doctor with what he said next.

"Najenda, however...we did everything we could, but the damage was far too severe." informed the doctor, Esdeath's heart sinking down into the pit of her stomach. "She won't live long enough to see tomorrow's sunrise. I'm sorry."

"S-She's going to die?"

The doctor nodded and he motioned to Esdeath specifically, "She didn't want to speak with anyone else but you, Ma'am.

Esdeath looked over at Tatsumi, wanting him to any something, but all he did was use his hand to tell her that she needed to go. She blinked a few times and walked past the doctor into the infirmary, going past the rows of beds to the one at the very end next to Lubbock's. She moved aside the white curtain and looked down upon Najenda, who was resting in the bed with bandages covering her abdomen and bloody patches spread across her body.

Since it would kill her quickly if they had removed it, the doctors had left the icicle in her chest in its spot and merely cleaned the blood around it until the cold weapon froze the skin around it to the point it stopped bleeding.

Her eyes were barely open, and when she saw Esdeath standing at the foot of her bed she smiled weakly. "Hey...Esdeath."

"Hey Najenda. Are you, um...feeling okay?" asked Esdeath, unsure of what to say to her friend in the state she was in.

"Esdeath, you don't have to keep the truth from me. I know I'm not gonna living through this. I accepted this fate when I defected from the Empire and became the leader of Night Raid." criticized Najenda sternly, her sharp tongue causing Esdeath to lower her gaze.

Najenda sighed and got rid of her frown so she could replace it with a smile as she painfully pushed herself up off the pillow to speak with her eye to eye.

"Esdeath, about all those years ago, when you attacked me for defecting. I've been denying it for quite some time now, but...I don't blame you. You were just following orders. And it took me a while to accept the fact that you had changed from your old self when Tatsumi brought you along with the rest of the Jaegers to us." said Najenda, having to stop and take a few moments to catch her breath and relax since it was painful to talk.

"What are you saying, Najenda?" asked Esdeath.

"Tatsumi...I admire him. He's done so much for all of us. He gave up his life as a member of Night Raid, but yet he still held ties with us and desired to bring an end to the tyrannical rule the Prime Minister has over the Empire. He was able to change you, he was able to bring us together. I heard from Chelsea that he took on Budo along just to protect all of you, even though he himself was heavily injured and exhausted. He-"

Najenda suddenly stopped and started to hack out blood, but before Esdeath could try and get her to lay back down and rest she held a hand up and wiped her lips clean, smiling weakly afterwards.

"What I'm trying to say is this...you two are the key to everything. You two will be the ones to change the Empire for the better and eliminate all of the corruption, tyranny, and greed that's been plaguing it for so long. Myself, Lubbock, the rest of Night Raid and the Revolutionary Army...we were only the catalysts that set the stone in motion."

Najenda placed a hand on Esdeath's shoulder and looked her dead in the eyes, ensuring that what she said next would be heard clearly. "Promise me this. You and Tatsumi...you need to finish what we started. Kill the Prime Minister. Kill Jacqueline. Avenge those who have given the ultimate sacrifice for what they believed in."

Esdeath stared at her for a few seconds before she let out a steady breath and wiped a single tear from the corner of her eye, her arms wrapping around Najenda gently so she wouldn't press down on the icicle still in her chest. "Okay...I will. I swear on it."

Najenda closed her eyes and accepted the hug from her friend, the two of them sharing what most likely would be their final moment with one another before Esdeath let go and eased her back onto the bed. She said one final goodbye and left Najenda to herself and her thoughts, the Night Raid leader slowly closing her eyes and resting her hand on her stomach.

" _Lubbock...I'm sorry I have to leave you like this. I wish I had more time...to show you that you weren't the only one...I...I'll miss you…_ "

A few hours later, Najenda, the leader of the infamous assassin organization known as Night Raid, whom was born out of the desire to kill those of the Empire who oppressed the people and committed evil acts solely for their own personal gain...passed away in her sleep. The doctor watching over her said that it was actually quite peaceful, as if all of the worries she had inside of her had vanished, and she was able to move on to the next life with no regrets.

Lubbock awoke from his slumber an hour after that and, after he was told of Najenda's death, he informed them all of what she herself had told him back at the cliffside. In her own words, said that as of her death, Night Raid was to fully merge with the Jaegers into one organization, with the leaders consisting of Tatsumi and Esdeath.

Their one goal was simple, and coincided with what Najenda had said to Esdeath. To provide a safe and peaceful future for the next generation to come by killing the root of all evil within the Empire.

They were to kill Prime Minister Honest. At _all_ costs.


	42. Remembering the Fallen

A/N So what do I do, kill Mine, and only a few chapters later, Run dies, Lubbock gets fucked up and Najenda gets killed. You all probably hate me by now. Hehe, I'm such an asshole. But, everyone, as of now, there are only a few chapters left until the Epilogue. Guys, and Gals, we're almost there. This is the final stretch, we're reaching the climax of this epic tale. Let's push on through to end! Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 41 - Remembering the Fallen**

A couple of days after the Jaegers and Night Raid had arrived at the Shisuikan, the remnants of the Revolutionary Army and the Path of Peace arrived at the fortress and joined the ranks of the Straelkan Army. It was a breath of fresh air for Tatsumi and Esdeath to see the Lord again after such a long time and, when he learned of what had occurred since their last meeting, he offered his condolences to them and assured them that their friends will be remembered as heroes for their actions.

Thernadier met with Camilla once everything was all settled and the twos waited for the Western Nations' army to arrive before they began talks of strategy, and thankfully they didn't have to wait long. The very next day as the sun rose up over the horizon they could see the one hundred thousand men they still possessed marching side by side with their former enemies, the Hellraisers, with the giant hulking form of Hræsvelgr rumbling along behind them. They confidently strolled up to the Shisuikan, ready to take on the challenge presented to them of assaulting the Imperial Capital.

Camilla and Thernadier, as well as the Lord, waited at the gate and met with General Hiruko, Fiona, and Rafe, the small group chatting amongst themselves for a few minutes before they left to go and share their thoughts on how they would lay siege to the Imperial Capital.

To assist them, Camilla called upon Tatsumi and Esdeath to join them since they have had the most experience with their enemy, namely the Empire's Great General and her subordinate.

"Now that we are all here, allow me to start this meeting off by welcoming the Princess here over to our continent and personally showing you my gratitude for joining our cause to rid the Empire of those who have wronged its people for so long." started off Thernadier while standing up from his seat at the circular table and bowing towards Camilla, the Princess smiling and accepting his thanks.

"Of course. The Empire and that Prime Minister have done something terrible to all of us. Because of them...my parents were murdered, and here recently, my second-in-command as well as my closest friend was kidnapped. I'm not going to stop until I see those responsible dead on the ground or behind bars." said Camilla with a scowl on her face, the other revolutionary leaders nodding their heads in silent agreement.

"And with that out of the way, I'd like to introduce myself to you all, if you do not know who I am." said Rafe as he stood up and looked from one person to the other. "My name is Raphael Costner, formerly a Lieutenant Colonel of the Imperial Military and current leader of the formerly Empire-aligned Surprise and Attack Division "Hellraisers"."

"It's a pleasure to have you here, Lieutenant Colonel." said the Lord with a smile, Rafe nodding his head once before he returned to his seat.

"Okay, let's get this meeting started. First order of business, we pay our respects to Najenda, Night Raid's leader who as of late has passed away. She was a wonderful ally and confidante to the Revolutionary, as well as a personal friend of mine, so this fight has become personal for me." started off Thernadier before he shared a moment of silence for Najenda, Tatsumi and Esdeath gathering themselves for when the Revolutionary Army commander would hand the floor to them.

Once a proper amount of time had passed, Thernadier cleared his throat and held a hand up to them while grinning at the same time. "Now I would like to hand this over to Tatsumi and Esdeath. They've had the most experience in dealing with our enemies, so they'll be the ones to provide some key insight onto how we should plan our attack on the capital."

Tatsumi cleared his throat and he stood up with Esdeath, all of the eyes in the room falling onto them. "Allow me to start off by saying that the greatest threat the Empire poses to us and our forces is in the form of the Great General herself. Her name is Jacqueline, and compared to Budo...she's a hell of alot worse.

"Yes, we know she's strong. But could you clarify?" asked Kagetane, Esdeath crossing her arms and glaring at him.

"Jacqueline is in possession of two Teigu at the moment, one being named Basilisk that she got from the deceased Danger Beast Hunter Copra, and the other being her primary. It's called Devil's Heart, and it is what has allowed her to create an infamous reputation for herself." she explained before her gaze dropped and she shivered slightly. "It enables her to weaponize her own skeletal structure and also heal any injury she sustains, whether it be minor or life-threatening. I've seen it for myself as has Tatsumi."

"How so?" questioned the Lord.

"A friend of ours, Maya Gleipnir, the former second-in-command to Great General Budo and youngest ever member of the Imperial Guard, at age fourteen, delivered a punch to Jacqueline's jaw that shattered her spinal chord and twisted her head around almost one hundred and eighty degrees."

Tatsumi cringed at the memory of how gruesome the injury was, but what was even worse was how she instantly fixed it like it had never had happened, and then proceeded to eliminate Maya from the fight with no problems whatsoever.

"Other injuries she has sustained that she was able to heal were having both of her arms cut off, Tatsumi very nearly bisecting her, and she also had all of her bones crushed and all of her arteries imploded by a deceased member of Night Raid several months earlier. She's been able to survive through all of this because of Devil's Heart, proving that she will be our toughest adversary."

Everyone in attendance at the meeting aside from Rafe and Camilla were left absolutely flabbergasted at how the Great General had been able to survive all of those horrible injuries. To think that there was someone like that out there was simply astounding.

"And that's not all. Her subordinate, Kahfka, is incredibly strong. By removing the blood from an arm Esdeath lost a few months earlier, she got it back thanks to Solomon's blood, and drinking it, Kahfka has become a full-fledged user of Demon's Extract, the same Teigu she uses."

From there on the meeting proceeded with the two informing their allies of everything they could possibly know about Jacqueline and Kahfka, and that the truth of the matter was that they were the only two people capable of stopping them. They also informed them that Jacqueline was a crafty and very intelligent opponent, so there was no doubt that during her time as Great General she has made countless additions to the capital's defensive measures that they would have no idea what or where they would be until they would be used.

And so, the plan of attack began to take shape. The Revolutionary Army, path of Peace, Western Nations' Army and Straelkan Army would surround the entire Imperial Capital and lay siege to the city in order to draw out the Great General and her subordinate. Once that happened, they would send in some of their forces to sweep the city while the rest would prepare and fortify themselves for when the Shikoutazer would make its appearance. If and when it did, Rafe and his division would utilize Hræsvelgr to turn the tides and level the playing field, so to speak.

"To be perfectly honest...I think we'll be able to pull this off. Everything seems to be in place. This plan looks foolproof."

"There's just one thing left we have to account for." interrupted Tatsumi with a dark tone in his voice. "The Prime Minister. He's the root of all of the problems within the Empire. If he escapes...he'll just try his luck somewhere else."

"Then what do you suggest, Tatsumi?" asked Fiona, the Jaeger staring at her and closing his eyes.

"If we cannot lure out Jacqueline and Kahfka, then we need to send in a small strike team made up entirely of Teigu users to hunt down the Prime Minister and any other corrupt politicians or military officers." he explained, a silent murmur going from one person sitting at the table to the next, until Thernadier was the last one left to agree to the idea.

"Very well. Who are you thinking of?"

"Myself, Esdeath, and Akame. The latter's Murasame will prove to be an effective tool against Jacqueline, since not even she can withstand the sword's poison."

"If it's all the same to you, Commander Thernadier...we'd like to be the ones to remove Jacqueline's head from her shoulders. She's killed a lot of our friends, both from the Jaegers and the now dissolved Night Raid, as well as threatened our daughter by sending an assassin to kill us in our sleep." added in Esdeath, her bloodlust beginning to show itself and cloud the room in darkness. "This is _beyond_ personal...for both of us."

Thernadier slowly nod his head and rested his elbows on the table, mulling over the battle strategy in his mind to ensure there were no flaws or problems within it. Once he found none, and upon asking the other revolutionary leaders if they had no problems with the strike team suggestion Tatsumi had, he returned his gaze to them and smiled.

"Very well, it has been settled. In three days time, we attack the Imperial Capital. It's time to bring an end to this revolution once and for all!"

 **\- Fortress Infirmary -**

 **\- Fifteen Minutes Later -**

Wave grumbled a little as the fogginess of sleep began to lift off of him, the pain in his head and limbs making itself known all at once and causing him to grunt and remain still for a few seconds until it vanished. When he felt better, he slowly pushed himself off the bed he found himself on and immediately noticed Akame was sitting right next to him in a chair, only...she wasn't awake.

While he had been comatose, she had sat by his side the entire time and, eventually, she too fell asleep and had rested her head and arms on the bed sheets next to his side. That's when he reached up to his face and gasped silently as his fingers scraped across the scale-like skin present under his eyes.

" _What...happened to me?_ " he thought to himself when he became aware of the effects forcefully evolving Grand Chariot had brought onto him.

He could already feel something had changed inside of him, and upon reaching over to a nearby table to pick up a mirror, he saw the full extent of his partial transformation. His eyes had turned into that of Tyrant's, with the cross-slit pupil and all, and that his fingers had been right, there were scales developing underneath his eyes and across his cheeks over the bridge of his nose. He opened his mouth and even saw that some of his teeth had already sharpened themselves out into fangs.

He could hardly remember what had happened the last time he was awake. There was the sight of Run, dead on the ground, and then the anger. There was so much anger and _rage_ , and then after that, the last thing he remembered was the roar of a dragon before everything went dark.

Wave set down the mirror and returned his attention to Akame when she shifted slightly, a smile appearing on his face as he gently rested a hand on top of her head and softly ran his fingers through her jet black hair.

" _I must've scared you so much…_ " he thought before Akame let out a breath and her eyes fluttered open, Wave removing his hand so that she could lean back up into the chair.

She rubbed her eyes to get rid of the groggy feeling and looked at Wave, her lips curling up into a smile when he saw that he had finally returned back to normal...for the most part.

"Hey, um, I know this is a weird question to ask after you just woke up, but...could you tell me what happened to me?" he asked while pointing at the draconian features he now possessed, Akame's smile dropping a second later.

She explained to him what the doctor watching over him had told her, and when she finished Wave rested his hands in his laps and sighed heavily. "So...it's that bad, huh?"

"Wave, you can't use Grand Chariot any more. If you do, you'll die."

"I'm sorry, Akame, but I can't do that. I still have a job to do as a Jaeger to protect the people of the Empire and rid it of the tyranny of the Prime Minister." replied Wave with a glare at her, Akame's lower lip quivering slightly.

Suddenly she threw her arms around him and hugged him tightly, Wave's eyes shooting wide open in surprise. "Akame…"

"I don't want to watch any more of my friends and loved ones die…" she murmured, on the verge of tears.

Wave's chest tightened up and he closed his eyes while he brought up an arm to rest on Akame's back and return her hug, the two sharing a moment of silence before he pulled her off of him and looked her in the eyes.

"Akame, listen to me. I have no intention of dying." he said with a grin, being sure to look directly at Akame to let her know he was serious. "I swear on my life that I'll stay myself until this revolution is over. I'm not going to let some dragon take over my body, because I know there's still someone I need to protect above everything else."

Akame's eyes widened a fraction of an inch when she recognized the tone in his voice and she smiled, Wave's grin morphing into a cheesy smile as he ran a hand through his hair and she wiped away the tears.

"Idiot…" muttered Akame with a blush before she grabbed Wave's scarf and pulled him into kiss.

Instead of being caught off guard like the first time, Wave took her affection and gave it back in the exact same way. She let go of his scarf after their lips met and brought her arm around his neck, disregarding his draconian features and silently professing her feelings for the person he was on the inside.

When she pulled away Wave cupped her cheek and looked her dead square in the eyes, "Akame, after this war is over, I'll sail you to the ends of the earth so that you can see for yourself how wonderful it is out there."

"Okay...I'll be looking forward to it." she replied, the assassin then climbing off of his bed so that he could get up and stretch his achy limbs.

Wave glanced over to his right and saw Grand Chairiot's key leaning up against the bedside, his smile vanishing for a fraction of a second as he thought back to what Akame had said about him possibly dying from using the armor. She could see the apprehension on his face while he stared at the cutlass, but after a few moments he discarded those bad thoughts and picked up the blade.

They left the infirmary walking side by side and tracked down their friends, whom they found gathered in a secluded part of the fortress with somber expressions and pained hearts. Wave chose a seat by Chelsea on a crate and smiled a little at her Akame sitting down on the other side of her before they all looked over at Tatsumi and Esdeath. A few moments later Maya appeared and leaned up against the wall a few feet away from them, her eyes going to Wave and becoming soft at his changed appearance.

Even though they weren't speaking, they were all sharing the same thought process. From when the Jaegers and Night Raid first joined...they had lost so many of their friends. First it was Bols, then Gazia, then Kurome, followed by Mine and Run, and then recently even Najenda. Fourteen people had just dropped down to only eight, and with Lubbock out of commision, Leone not wanting to partake any longer, Arthur staying with the latter to watch over her, and Solomon still trapped somewhere within the Imperial Capital….they were only at six now.

"It's...finally gonna happen, huh?" asked Chelsea in a low tone, Tatsumi glancing up at her with Esdeath and staring for a few seconds. "We're going to attack the Imperial Capital...we're gonna bring an end to this war."

"Yeah...we are." spoke up Maya.

"We've...we've lost a lot of good friends along the way. When we left the capital all those months ago, Bols sacrificed his life to delay Budo and give us time to escape." said Wave when he thought back to that time, Esdeath and Tatsumi lowering their gazes and closing their eyes in remembrance.

"Gazia did the same for us when we first fought Jacqueline. If he hadn't stepped in...I don't think we would be alive right now." said Tatsumi while he reached over and held Esdeath's hand tightly. "And Akame...I can't even begin to describe how much of a close friend Kurome was to us. Run was the same way as well, so having them gone...it's a heavy blow to us too."

They remained silent for another few minutes so that they could get their feelings in check, and when she felt that the time was right, Esdeath opened her eyes and looked up at Akame.

"I...I need to say something." she said timidly, their eyes rising up to hers as she let out a deep breath and gathered herself.

"I've already said this to Tatsumi a couple of times, but if I had the chance to do all of this again...I would. Akame you know just what kind of horrible things I did in the past, like torturing innocent people and burying over four hundred thousand men, women and children from the North alive, and Wave knows how I used to act as well before meeting Tatsumi." she started off, Tatsumi keeping her hand intertwined with his to tell her that he was there if needed. "I was cruel, sadistic and enjoyed watching those below me suffer...and it pains me now to think back and see that I actually did all of those things."

She shivered at the memory and, for the first time since they came together as allies, Akame truly started to see just how much Esdeath had changed from her previous self. It was mind-boggling to see that she actually cringed now at the thought of torture, and how she regretted all of her past actions while she was still a General of the Empire.

"But...thanks to Tatsumi, I was able to meet all of you and make peace with Najenda. I've been able to learn what it truly means to value a friend...which is why all of this death and watching those I care about die before my very eyes...my heart hurts more then it ever has…"

Esdeath let go of Tatsumi's hand and brought hers up to her chest, touching the tattoo at the base of her neck and shaking again when her emotions started to rise up from within. Suddenly, without saying a word, Akame stood up and walked up to her in order to throw her arms around the former General and hug her. Esdeath gasped a little, but soon a smile appeared on her face as she hugged Akame back and allowed for a single tear to roll down her cheek.

"I hope that what I do now...will make up for all that I've done. I hope that you can forgive me…"

"I've done terrible things in the past as well...and I believe that the only way to make up for it is to free the Empire from the evil that's corrupted it. To kill those who oppress others." whispered Akame as she let got of Esdeath and gave her a smile to show that she understood.

"I remember something that Bulat told me a short while after I joined Night Raid. He said, "You'll have some painful, despair-ridden experiences. In fact, most of them will be tragic."" added Tatsumi while crossing his arms.

The group remained silent, with Maya closing her eyes and thinking of her parents, Wave remembering Bols, Run, and Kurome alongside Akame, Chelsea thinking back to the cruel man she had once served, and Tatsumi himself paying his silent respects to his friends.

""But we chose to walk this path. We'll take on the dirty work, and change the world. After we finish, we can disappear." Right now, I understood those words even more so then before. Like Wave stated, we've lost a lot of good friends, but we can't stop now...not when we're so close."

"He's right." said Akame, her smile dropping into a more serious expression. "As the survivors, we carry the feelings of those who've passed away on our shoulders. Sheele, Bulat, Mine, all of our friends who have died up till now...we cannot let their sacrifices be in vain. They died for what they believed in, a nation free of evil, corruption, and greed, and it would be an insult to their memory if we stopped now."

"And it's only right that we finish what they started. In three days time, we're going to bring an end to this fight once and for all." said Maya after pushing herself off the wall she was leaning on and joining the circle, throwing an arm around Wave and grinning.

"We'll make them pay for all of the horrible things they've done, and for all the innocent people they killed." added Chelsea.

"For all of our fallen comrades and friends, and for the next generation…" started Tatsumi before he stood next to Esdeath and embraced her, referring to their daughter waiting for them back in Straelka. "We'll finish this fight. We _will_ change the Empire for the better."

 **\- Imperial Cemetery, Imperial Capital -**

Jacqueline and Kahfka silently entered the shrine built for their friend and approached his tombstone, a fresh bouquet of flowers in Jacqueline's hand. She reached down and pulled out the withered roses already in a small pot and placed the new ones inside, smiling softly a she thought of the Inquisitor and how much he had loved roses.

" _I hope you like these just like the ones before, Roman._ " she thought with a little pain in her heart before she took a step back, Kahfka placing an arm around her shoulders.

"It's just not the same without him. I wish he was still here." said Kahfka with longing in her tone of voice, Jacqueline slowing nodding her head in agreement.

"I miss him too...after my parents died, he was the only family I had. And now that he's gone...there's just an empty void in my heart where he used to be…" she replied before a thought entered her mind and she glanced at Kahfka, an inquisitive look on her face. "Speaking of that, I never learned what happened to your family."

Kahfka sighed heavily and she placed her other hand on her hip while thinking back to her youth, and almost immediately remembered why she stopped thinking about. It in the first place.

"They died. My mother, father, and my brother."

"How did they die…?" asked Jacqueline gently, wanting to be sure she wasn't opening old wounds.

"They were killed by Imperial Soldiers when they refused to give me over to be put into the training for the Elite Seven. After a struggle ensued where, in the end, I agreed to let them take me so as to protect my family...they still shot them all dead." Kahfka's expression darkened as her anger and hatred showed itself, Jacqueline''s expression softening out of sympathy for her. "I could've protected them, but I wasn't strong enough. That's why I kept my hatred under wraps and joined the Elite Seven, so that I could get stronger in order to protect the ones I cared about."

Kahfka then turned her head and looked directly into Jacqueline's eyes, the Great General seeing years of untold pain and suffering as well as anger within them. She had seen that look before, in fact, she sees it practically almost every day when she looks into the mirror at herself.

"That's why I joined you...so that I could get stronger to protect you. The best thing that's ever happened to me was falling in love with you, and now more then ever do I want to remain strong in order to protect you."

"Kahfka…" murmured Jacqueline in awe before she took Kahfka into her arms and clutched her tightly. "You..."

"I swear, I'll stay by your side through any obstacle or challenge. I'll help you accomplish your goal." said Kahfka with every fiber of her being, Jacqueline looking into her eyes again and smiling.

"You really are the only one for me…"

They spent a few more minutes there at the Inquisitor's final resting place before they left and returned to the Reconditioning Department, the pair walking into Jacqueline's personal chamber where she locked the door behind them and grinned mischievously. Kahfka glanced over her shoulder and immediately recognized the look on her face, so she slipped off her trench coat and beckoned her over to her while she began to walk backwards towards the bedroom.

As they stepped inside onto the carpeted floor, both lovers began to shed their clothes until they both fell down onto the bed completely naked and already absorbed in one another. Kahfka assaulted Jacqueline's lips while she pressed her body up against hers and ran her hand sensually up and down her thigh, the Great General beginning to let outlittle moans of pleasure as she started to feel hot on the inside.

"My, you are getting me all hot and bothered…" murmured Jacqueline after Kahfka pulled away, a dirty grin on her face. "You're gonna have to own up to your actions."

Suddenly she brought her right hand up and inserted her index and middle fingers into Kahfka's entrance, and when she leaned back a little while biting her lower lip Jacqueline used her other hand to start groping one breast and her mouth to suck on the other.

"Ahh...be gentle…" said Kahfka with a heavy breath as her interior walls were stirred around by Jacqueline''s fingers, the pleasure they brought to her dropping a cloud over her mind that made it hard to focus and keep herself composed.

Jacqueline moved over to her other breast and bit down gently on the nipple with her front teeth, tugging on it lightly at the same time as her opposite hand sunk itself into her second breast. Kahfka gasped and Jacqueline felt the fingers inside of her lover become wetter and she smiled, Kahfka's blush reddening in embarrassment when she removed them from her now dripping wet sex.

"I think you've learned your lesson." said Jacqueline as she let go of her breasts and cupped Kahfka's cheeks in order to move her head down towards her own sex.

"Now...I want you to ravage me…"

Jacqueline spread her legs apart and gave Kahfka and unrestricted view, the assassin's lips curling up into a lust-filled smile as she leaned down and stuck her tongue out. Jacqueline closed her eyes and moaned when she felt Kahfka slowly drag her tongue across her entrance, stopping at her clit and sucking on it. After a few seconds she fully pushed her tongue past her folds into her entrance, her saliva mixing with her lover's juices and producing a sort-of sweet tasting concoction.

"Oh...yes...it's been too long…" said Jacqueline as she played with Kahfka's hair, her fingers ducking and weaving through the silky strands and curling it around them.

Still not completely satisfied yet, Jacqueline delegated her right hand as the one that continued to mess with Kahfka''s hair and used her left hand to fondle her breasts since they hadn't been attended to yet.

Kahfka then removed her tongue from her lover's sex and scooted up a little before sitting down with her legs thrown towards Jacqueline. She supported herself with her arms and when their inner thighs touched one another, she started to move her hips in a circular motion and grinded her entrance against Jacqueline's.

Several minutes passed by before they both reached their climax and stopped for the day, the two lovers curling up against one another on the bed and resting their sore and aching bodies. Jacqueline had one arm wrapped around Kahfka's shoulders while Kahfka herself had her hand resting on her stomach and her left leg hugging Jacqueline's left thigh.

She couldn't help but giggle at how Kahfka was helping herself to her breasts, her lips cupped around one of her nipples like a newborn babe. Eventually she became satisfied and nestled her head on the bed next to Jacqueline, her chin slightly jutting into the top of her shoulder blade.

"I never want to leave your side…" she said with a smile, Jacqueline turning her head in order to look into Kahfka's eyes.

"And I yours…" she replied back, following up with a kiss before they began to drift off to sleep.

Before she allowed herself to be taken into slumber's comforting embrace, her mind drifted back to a crying child surrounded by a sight no one should ever have to see at such a young age. Mixed feelings of anger and sadness arose from within and she told herself again of the reasons why she was doing this, why she had put all the puzzle pieces into place.

Two _very_ distinct reasons.

 **\- Fortress Shisuikan -**

 **\- Nightfall -**

"Tatsumi, is everything okay? You seem troubled." asked Esdeath as she climbed into bed, the room they were given in the fortress a decent size that would suit their needs.

"Yeah, I'm fine." he replied after pulling up the cover, his wife turning onto her side and propping her arm in order to rest her chin on her hand while giving him a hard stare.

"No, you're not." she accused of him. "Tell me what's bothering you."

Tatsumi sighed and accepted the fact that he wasn't going to be able to talk himself out of this situation, so he rested his back against the headrest and crossed his arms across his chest.

"It's just that...it's something about Jacqueline…"

"What do you mean?"

"When I was there, in her personal chambers within the torture chambers, I got to see for myself how she lived and carried herself outside of her duties as Great General. She and that other girl, Kahfka, the one with white hair...they love each other, very dearly if I do say so myself." explained Tatsumi to Esdeath, who listened carefully and waited for him to finish before she would add her thoughts.

"In a sense, they're sort of like the parallel of us, you and I. I could see that either one of them would put themselves in harm's way to protect each other, which means that they'll be an almost unstoppable force in battle." he continued on before he furrowed his brow and looked down at his wife, who was still laying on her side.

"But...there's something else I saw, something that I can't quite wrap my head around."

"What is it?"

"I never noticed it before, but every time I looked at Jacqueline's eyes...I could see a different part of her, so to speak. And I don't know from when or what, but there was some sense of pain in her eyes, like there had been some event in her life that was so traumatizing that even if she tried to hide it, the signs would never go away. You know what I'm saying?"

Esdeath nodded as she pushed herself up and scooted over to where she was right up against him and was resting her head on his shoulder, her right hand intertwining itself with his left hand. "Yes, we all have something like that within us. I can see it in Maya's eyes especially because of the death of her parents."

"Well, what I'm saying is that after seeing those things, it got me wondering...could there have been something that had made her into who she is?" questioned Tatsumi with a slightly disgruntled look. "Don't get me wrong, what she's done to us, our friends, and an innumerable amount of people has been horrible and cruel, but…"

"You're thinking that there's a way to save her, like you did with me...right?" said Esdeath to finish his sentence for him, Tatsumi slowly nodding his head to confirm her statement.

They sat there in utter silence for a few seconds while the question drifted overtop of them like some dark storm cloud. Tatsumi had been right about saying what Jacqueline has done as of yet had been horrible, but soon after they began to compare that with the actions of the Prime Minister, and then to _themselves_. Esdeath had been personally responsible for the pillaging of the Ban Tribe's Village and the live burial of over four hundred thousand people from the North. Akame, while a member of the Elite Seven, had assassinated an untold amount of people who were thought to be threats to the Empire. Maya had slaughtered Imperial Guards just doing their job in a fit of rage, and literally all of Night Raid's members have also assassinated people under the cover of darkness.

Even though some of those killed deserved punishment, the fact of the matter was that they were still living, breathing _people_. And when they thought back to the Prime Minister, it became clear that when he was compared with Jacqueline...it became obvious who was the lesser of two evils.

"Do you think there's actually a chance?" asked Tatsumi, Esdeath closing her eyes and thinking for a few moments over the subject matter.

"Tatsumi, you were able to change me a great deal from my previous self, and I believe only you could have been the one to accomplish that. And seeing how every time I've seen Jacqueline it's like I'm looking into a mirror to the past…there might actually be a sliver of hope for her."

With that fact established, another thought entered their minds like a bolt of lightning. If there was a chance, a sliver of a _possibility_ , that Jacqueline could be redeemed, when they eventually ended up fighting, which they both knew would happen...they would be presented with a choice.

Should they kill her, or should they spare her?


	43. Let the Games Begin!

A/N All of you up until last chapter wanted me kill Jacqueline, huh. Because she tortured and killed Kurome among other things. Well, everyone, it's not going to be so simple. Allow me to remind everyone of Akame ga Kill's one, undisputed fact. There is no such thing as true "good". Every character shown thus far has done something that has tainted them. Esdeath may be different now and is a much cheerful person and all, but like I stated last chapter, she killed over 400,000 people and tortured countless others! But, still, she was eventually forgiven. So next time you think on Jacqueline and her character, think on this. Does she need to die? Or does even someone like her deserve a second chance?

Also, in other news, I'm getting ever closer to determining if I create a sequel for this story. What I've come up with so far are some new characters, and if it does come into fruition, I also have a title already made. It would be called "A Different Path - Ancient Resurgence" or something along those lines. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 42 - Let the Games Begin!**

 **\- Unknown Amount of Years Prior -**

The sky was dark black, the sun unable to penetrate the trough the thick smoke columns rising up into the air. The screams of the tortured were all echoing all around as a relatively small town was in the midst of being burnt to the ground. Men dressed in thick rubberized clothing carrying huge fuel tanks on their backs were torching every building they passed by with large flamethrowers, and if a person just so happened to run in front of them or try to escape, they would consume them in flames.

Among all of the carnage and destruction, however, the screams that were the loudest of them all came from a small child trapped beneath the rubble of her house. She desperately was trying to free herself as tears streamed down her ash covered cheeks, the sight happening before her very eyes engraving itself in her mind like a knife would dig into flesh. Two people, a man and a woman, were screaming and crying to the heavens in overwhelming agony as their clothes turned to ash and their skin began to melt away from their bones. The horrific nightmare lasted all throughout the day into the afternoon, where after the flamethrower wielding men had left, the town had been transformed into a ghost town littered with the scorched corpses of its denizens and the charred skeletons of the buildings.

The young child, who had passed out earlier from exhaustion and from screaming her lungs out, coughed and slowly awoke from her stupor. Unfortunately she was moved from one horror to another as she pulled herself out of the rubble and slowly walked over to the small clearing that used to be a living room. Lying on the ground were the blackened skeletons of her parents, all of their limbs pulled up towards their chest to show they had died in agony except for an arm from both, where in between each other they held hands.

"M-Mama...P-Papa..." murmured the child as tears began to emerge from the corner of her eyes again, her knees striking the ash and dirt after they gave out on her.

When the crushing reality finally hit her she screamed as loud as her young lungs could allow her to, the silent audience of the city listening to her shrieks of sorrow as her entire world came down around her and threw her into the deepest, darkest pits of despair.

 **\- Imperial Training Grounds, Imperial Capital -**

 **\- Present Day -**

Since spies had reported that the enemies of the Empire were all gathered at the Fortress Shisuikan, and that an attack on the capital in a few days time was inevitable, the final precautions were being put into place to protect the city. While the defenses were raised in anticipation and the soldiers stationed in the capital reported to their positions, Jacqueline and Kahfka had been putting into motion their own plans.

While the Prime Minister was busy with his own schemes, they gathered the Faceless at one of larger training grounds under his orders and organized all of the members into straight and neat lines. After a few seconds Jacqueline appeared at the front of the elite division with her hands in her trench coat pockets and a grin on her face, her eyes going from one end of the first row to the other. The Faceless Commanding Officer, who separated himself from the others of his division by a unique symbol on his helmet just above his visor, stood a few feet beside her on her left, with Kahfka just behind him.

"I appreciate all of you coming out here to meet me here on such short notice, but we all know the reason why I've done this. The Empire's enemies are at our doorstep, and an attack is inevitable, so all of the remaining forces we possess are being mobilized to ensure this city shall fall, which includes the Faceless." she started off, the elite guards remaining utterly silent like she had expected.

"As Great General, it is my duty to ensure the safety of the Emperor. So, I ask of you all, in the event of the city's fall and the enemy manages to penetrate through the last line of defense into the Imperial Palace, I want all of you to do one thing, and one thing only." she continued before making a quick glance at the Faceless CO and widened her smile ever-so-slightly. "Protect the Emperor at all costs. But, as for the Prime Minister...allow him to die."

Just like she and Kahfka had expected, the entire division of Faceless grew rigidly still and the CO turning his head to look at her directly, a look of shock undoubtedly present on his face beneath his helmet.

"Excuse me?" he asked, the Great General looking up at him and narrowing her eyes.

"You heard me. Let the Prime Minister die, and if our enemies can't even succeed, then I'll kill him myself."

"You would dare say that in front of me? Our service goes to the Prime Minister, not _you_." snarled the Faceless CO before he pointed his halberd at Jacqueline's throat.

She merely giggled at the threat and cocked her head to the right a little, saying, "You really are foolish, aren't you?"

All of a sudden the man gasped when Kahfka forcefully jabbed an ice sword through his back and out of the center of his chest, his robes turning a dark shade of red as blood gushed out from the wound. She kicked his legs out from under him and watched with Jacqueline as he fell off the stage a few yards away from the rest of the Faceless, her eyes rising from his corpse and up to the rest of the Faceless. With the snap of her fingers a contingent of the Imperial Guard appeared from seemingly thin air itself and surrounded the entire Faceless division, their shields raised up and their halberds at the ready in case there was any resistance.

"The Prime Minister is the root of all evil within this nation, and I have heard myself how he has twisted your original goal from protecting the Emperor's family and the interior of the palace to being his secret police force. Great General Budo held the same ideas about that man, so I am merely continuing where he left off. If any of you wish to remain loyal to the Prime Minister, please step forward."

Her question hung in the air for a few moments before a handful of Faceless, around twenty or so, took one step forward out of line. Kahfka walked up next to Jacqueline and smirked when she saw the gleam in her eyes, the same thought passing through both of their minds at once.

"Very well then. I've received your message...now allow me to show you _mine_."

Instantly Kahfka whipped her arm out to the side and created ice spears beneath each of the guards who stepped forward, the men underneath the robes and helmets gasping in shock when they were impaled through the stomach with such force it sent blood exploding out of their backs. The Faceless close to them uttered not a word and paid no attention to the deaths of their comrades, instead focusing all of their attention on Jacqueline and Kahfka.

"No one else? Good. Disregard your training under the Prime Minister and your former commanding officer, you no longer have to remain silent. I am your new commander, and you will answer to me and to me alone. Understood?"

Even though they still remained silent, the Faceless showcased their new loyalty by standing at attention and saluting her and Kahfka, her smile widening in satisfaction at the addition of the Faceless to her forces.

" _Now...there's only one last thing that I need._ " she thought to herself before she dismissed the Faceless and the Imperial Guards she had brought with her, the two Faceless guards she had first talked with joining her and Kahfka's side as she left the training ground.

They travelled through the capital streets and eventually arrived at the Scientific Research Building, the group of four walking inside and going to Dorothea's lab. Upon entering the large room Jacqueline saw the diminutive alchemist working on a red liquid sloshing around within glass stasis chamber in the center of the room, and when they got close she glanced back over her shoulder and grinned.

"So, it's completed?" asked Jacqueline, the alchemist nodding.

"Yeah, it's all finished and ready to be implemented. What exactly are you going to use it for though? And why did you want me to keep him around?" questioned Dorothea while motioning with her thumb to the holding chamber Solomon was in, the Great General chuckling to herself.

"Well, my dear, unfortunately I have something to tell you."

In the blink of an eye her hand rammed into Dorothea's throat and she raised the girl up into the air, her hands grappling at Jacqueline's while her feet kicked left and right to try and free herself.

"You've fulfilled your usefulness to me. Thank you Dorothea, I appreciate your assistance."

"Wait-" started Dorothea before Jacqueline squeezed her fingers and quickly flicked her wrist to the left to snap her throat, Kahfka walking around behind the girl and stabbing two icicles through her lower back to ensure her death.

Dorothea's eyes fluttered as the life escaped her body and she slumped over, Jacqueline letting go of her and pushing out a small bone shard from the palm of her hand. She crouched down next to Dorothea and used her other hand to open the alchemist's mouth in order to get an unrestricted view to the fangs she possessed.

" _Blood Absorption: Absordex...I'll be taking this._ "

With the bone shaft acting as a multi-purpose dental tool, Jacqueline forcibly removed the alchemist's jaw bones from her head and then the fangs themselves before discarding the jaws. Kahfka then stepped in to help Jacqueline pull out some of her own teeth in order to insert the Teigu in their vacant spots. Once the blood had been wiped away Jacqueline closed her mouth and waited for Devil's Heart to reconnect the nerves and flesh to the new teeth and, when the pain faded away she used her tongue to lick her new teeth and ensure that they were rooted in place.

"Did it work?" asked Kahfka as she returned to her feet and set her gaze on Solomon.

"There's only one way to find out."

She approached the super-chilled holding chamber for the Jaeger, and with the help off Kahfka and the two Faceless, they opened the heavy door so that she could walk inside and go up to Solomon with her hands in her pockets. He was very much awake, albeit severely weakened due to the intense cold his body was experiencing, and she stopped a foot away from him after he narrowed his eyes.

"What do you want…?" he asked in a low tone, the Great General giggling at the underlying threat in his tone.

"I admire your determination to remain steadfast against me, regardless of your situation, but there's nothing you can do." she replied before she gripped Solomon by the jaw and moved his head over to the right, revealing his bare neck. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll be taking some of your blood."

Without warning Jacqueline sunk Absordex into his neck and, like a vampire, began to suck up vast amounts of Solomon's Phoenix blood. As more and more of his bodily fluids were removed from his body, the Jaeger began to grow thin and turn into something close to an emaciated corpse just barely clinging on to life. Leaving just enough for him to regenerate the lost blood, she removed the fangs from his neck and wiped some blood and saliva from her lips while closing her eyes and taking in a deep breath.

Power coursed through her veins as the Phoenix blood mixed with her own, increasing her overall strength tenfold thanks to Absordex. Solomon's head fell forward when he passed out from having so much of his blood taken out in such a short amount of time, and seeing that her business was done with him at the moment, Jacqueline left the freezing chamber.

"Let us return to the Imperial Palace. Kahfka, make sure that this blood gets transferred over as well."

"Of course."

A few minutes later, within the expansive library contained within the Imperial Palace, a secret meeting between three of the ruling politicians that served alongside Honest were talking amongst themselves and planning for the inevitable end game they all knew was coming.

"In a few days time, the fated day...the main assault shall commence. For it to have fallen this far from the hearts' of its people, its highly unlikely the Imperial Capital can come out victorious…" said one with fairly large nose and a balding head of hair to his companions.

"If the massive army the Eastern Nation possesses, coupled with the entire Rebel Army, were to rush in on us...we would have little hope of fending them off.

"Perhaps...if we were to capture the Prime Minister…" stated of the oldest gentleman with shoulder-length white hair and a thin mustache, the other two politicians glancing his way. "And deliver him on a silver platter as a "present" to the Rebel Army...what do you think of our options next?"

"If we did that...they've have no choice by to be grateful to us, for sure." said the man with the big nose while a devious smile appeared on his face.

"Shall we then?" asked the third man with darker skin before going to take a sip of tea. "They may even allow us to defect and recruit all of our guards to join their cause…"

" _Ohhh_ …?"

They all whirled around in surprise when the Prime Minister, flanked by Jacqueline, entered the library room and stopped a few feet away from the table they sat at. Honest was chowing down on an entire cooked chicken with tears of faked sadness streaming down his cheeks while Jacqueline merely grinned at them with her hands behind her back, her eyes going from one politician to the other.

"All of that talk of subterfuge and conniving is breaking my heart, my esteemed colleagues...my tear ducts are very sensitive and I'm prone to fits of letting the water works fly...so please, don't give me a reason to." said Honest as he took a monstrous bite out of the chicken., the three men rocketing up out of their seats without a single word to say.

"I mean, this _would_ be the perfect opportunity to switch allegiances...I'd be an idiot not to keep tabs on those around me." said the Minister with a huge chunk of skin sticking out from between his teeth, his index finger pointing accusingly at his now _former_ colleagues. "You've been all too happy to feast on my leftovers with little to no consequence...but you were never above reproach."

The Prime Minister's entire mood quickly soured as his eyes narrowed to the point they almost closed shut, and when a heavy scowl so vile and filled with malicious intent appeared soon on his face, he dropped his hand and fully devoured the chicken in one bite.

"Skin them all...but do it while they breath...let us make an example of them."

"With pleasure, Prime Minister." replied Jacqueline before shrugging off her trench coat and grasping Basilisk in her right hand, a psychotic gleam in her eye.

Honest turned around when the screaming began, and when a stray drop of blood landed on his shoulder he produced a napkin from his pocket and wiped it away without the batting of an eyelash. The sounds of skin getting torn from flesh and blood splattering across the floor and walls was music to his ears, the deaths of those who would dare defy him allowing him to breath easy yet again and focus on what mattered, which was maintaining his control over the Empire and ensuring that the child Emperor was still his puppet.

"With all this stress over being backstabbed and betrayed, I might even end up going anorexic. Now then...I should probably see to it that his Majesty doesn't worry about anything unnecessary…"

 **\- Imperial Capital Coliseum -**

 **\- Thirty Minutes Later -**

The coliseum, which had since been repaired after the devastation it was faced with during the battle between the Jaegers and the late Great General Budo, had gained a new addition in the form of a roof that hid anything contained inside from the ground and from the air. However, through great caution, two Revolutionary Army spies managed to penetrate the arena and from a grate built into the stairs leading down one of the walkways of the spectator stands, with horror-filled expressions they bore witness to the creation of something truly terrifying.

"I-Impossible...they could actually do that?!" sputtered one spy with a stutter as they watched Kahfka lower her hands and grin, Jacqueline nodding her head in approval alongside the Prime Minister and the Emperor.

Filling up the entire arena floor were five rows of giant calvary men reminiscent of centaurs made entirely of ice, and to make them even more dangerous aside from the huge lances they wielded, covering their body was full-body armor made entirely out of Jacqueline's ultra-dense bones, turning them into literal mobile bunkers.

"Soldiers of ice...can these actually substitute for regular infantry?!"

Suddenly Kahfka turned her head and looked straight back at them, the spies rearing back like they had just been stabbed with a knife through the heart. Before they could run two pillars of ice emerged from the ground behind them and propelled them through the floor and out into the open, Jacqueline watching as they landed a few feet before her and the others.

"Seems we have some unwanted guests." said Kahfka with a giggle as she strolled up to the two men and stared down at them with her arms crossed across her chest, the two men quaking in fear of her and the killer intent she was secreting.

"Kahfka, execute." ordered Jacqueline, her lover responding by forming an ice sword that she used to behead one spy, and while the other was left totally frozen in place, she performed the same technique she used to kill Mine on him and turned his body into a fountain of blood.

"Excellent, excellent." remarked Honest happily with the death of the spies before turning to look at Jacqueline, a smile on his face. "If warm bodies are what we lack, then we can just create more soldiers out of thin air! This is unprecedented!"

"Indeed, Prime Minister. Our enemies will have no idea what to do against them, and since I already have my men stationed around the wall itself and the Imperial Guard atop it, I believe we're ready."

"There's only one thing left, actually." said the Prime Minister before he turned around and kneeled before the Emperor, the small child looking down on him from his miniature throne.

"Your Majesty, do us all the honor of using the "Supreme Teigu". The Rebel Army would be rendered speechless at the very sight of it, and with its power, they won't stand a chance."

"The time's...finally come?" he asked, a quick glance at Jacqueline and Kahfka and the two nodding their heads telling him to go along with Honest.

"Yes...after being upgraded, so to speak, by the greatest alchemic and scientific minds at our disposal, it has reached an unfathomable level of strength."

The Emperor put on a deeply concerned expression in order to appeal to the idea that he was still unaware of the treachery Honest had committed, and when he plastered a smile on his face and returned to standing before him he cleared his throat.

"You have nothing to be concerned about, your Highness. I'll be there with you every step of the way."

"O-Okay."

When the Emperor was helped out of his throne by Jacqueline and Kahfka, the duo escorting him out of the arena press box with a pair of Imperial Guards, the Prime Minister's smile turned from light-hearted to vile and malicious in the blink of an eye as he thought of the so-called Supreme Teigu.

" _Now, bring it on...you shit scum army! We'll leave a massacre so prodigious...it'll stain the annals of history for all time!_ "

 **\- Fortress Shisuikan -**

 **\- Three Days Later -**

Three days passed by in the blink of an eye, and soon enough, the combined army of the Kingdom of Straelka, Western Nations, Revolutionary Army, and Path of Peace organized themselves outside of the Shisuikan and began their march on the Imperial Capital. Staying behind was Rafe and the Hellraisers in order to operate Hræsvelgr, which disappointed the former Lieutenant Colonel greatly since he was wanting to participate in the battle, but when Fiona offered to stay behind with him, his attitude changed rather quickly and he agreed to the idea.

There were no laughs or smiles among the faces of those going into battle. This was the moment of truth, the day that they had all been fighting for. Today was the day that the Imperial Capital would fall and the tyrannical Prime Minister would die for his crimes against the general populace.

At the head of the massive army were the leaders of each respective faction, as well as Esdeath, Tatsumi, Wave, Akame and Maya, each riding a horse made of ice.

"Are you ready?" asked Tatsumi with a glance at his wife, Esdeath smirking as she brought up a hand and flexed her fingers a few times.

"I've been practicing with Demon's Extract over these last few days and I've come up with some interesting new techniques. If you thought the ones I had before were powerful, wait until you see these." she replied back.

Tatsumi couldn't help but grin at her before looking down at the back of his own hand, Tyrant's voice echoing inside of his mind from the day he and the Danger Beast fused together when he set eyes on the dragon-head tattoo. He then brought his gaze up to Wave, who had an expression devoid of emotion other then dire seriousness on his face, and once again stared at the scales and draconian features his friend now had. Then he leaned his head back to gaze up at the massive airships flying overhead, with Camilla and Chelsea standing within the bridge of the fleet leader, and smiled.

" _Everybody's been pushing themselves so hard to come to this, the climax. Sheele, Bulat, Gazia, Susanoo, Bols, Kurome, Run, and Najenda...I swear on my life that we're going to finish what you started._ "

Tatsumi stared out from the top of his horse to the horizon, the rising sun revealed the outline of the Imperial Capital in the distance. He clenched his jaw muscles and grinded his teeth against one another in animosity and anticipation, the culmination of everything they had all been through literally right before them.

"It's now or never. We're coming for you, Honest, you fat bastard. I'll be sure to sever your head personally."

In silence they all travelled across the surface of their earth to their final date with destiny, and when the sun reached its zenith in the sky above, the entire capital of the Empire had been surrounded by the combined army from the ground and air. Jacqueline's army and the remaining forces of the Imperial Military that had escaped destruction by the Straelkan Military were organized in a defensive circle around the Capital Defensive Wall, either dug into trenches or hidden behind metal barricades.

" _They have been preparing for this...seems the battle will take a little longer then it should._ " thought Esdeath as she took in the environment, her mind going to work developing a battle strategy for the here and now to coincide with the overall plan.

"Enemies as far as the eye can see...how beautiful…" murmured Jacqueline in awe as she set a foot on the edge of the wall and gazed out across the landscape, the lush forests that used to dominate a significant portion of the outskirts of the capital now completely gone.

They of course needed the resources to manufacture weapons, but the underlying reason why they had been so dutifully cleared out was to give their enemy nowhere to hide.

"They're planning to come at us from every direction...we're going to have our hands full, it seems." added on Kahfka before she grinned and manifested the ice horns from her hair, entering the heightened state she called "Cobalt Demon" mode.

Jacqueline crossed her arms and noticed Esdeath and Tatsumi out in front of the army facing directly towards where she stood, and she closed her eyes and took in a deep breath. Now was the time for the dominos to begin to fall.

She started to laugh as she crossed her arms over and grinned madly, her eyes set upon those who stood before. "Let the games begin!"


	44. Guardian of the Thousand-year old Empire

A/N May the Annual 75th Hunger Games commence! And may the odds be ever in your favor. Oh shit, wrong story. Anyways, yes my people, it has begun. The attack on the capital has finally arrived and we've entered final chapter territory. Let's finish it out on a good note! Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 43 - Guardian of the Thousand-year old Empire**

"Kahfka, wait to release the Ice Calvary on my command. For now, start off with a welcoming shot." ordered Jacqueline to a nearby officer from her army, the man saluting before he proceeded to give out the signal to somewhere beyond the wall.

A few moments later a swarm of artillery shells and flaming hunks of stone were launched out from the city to every corner of the battlefield, Esdeath laughing as she leaped off her horse and sprung up into the air.

"Something like that is a waste against us!" she bellowed when all of a sudden, two wings of ice sprouted from her back and she soared up even higher, the power of Demon's Extract flowing through every single one of her veins as she slapped her palms together. "Arktis Bastei!"

The ground rumbled and shook like a mighty giant had just awoken from its slumber, and in a sense, one had indeed one up in the form of a monumentally sized wall of ice that emerged from the earth before the ring of soldiers surrounding the capital. Higher and higher it grew until it rivaled the mighty wall protecting the city and, when the projectiles aimed at her allies arrived, Esdeath merely chuckled as they slammed into her barrier and hardly made a dent in it, the incredibly thick and dense ice wall proving to be more then effective.

"So this is the power of the Empire's Strongest General…" murmured a soldier in complete awe, his compatriot nodding his head in agreement.

"I'm glad she's on our side."

When the last artillery shell had struck the ice wall, Esdeath dropped her hands, the wall following her movements and lowering itself back down into the earth now that it's duty had been fulfilled. With the initial bombardment over, it was their turn to attack.

"All airships, forward." ordered Camilla with a blank expression, her airship along with the other three lurching forward while their bomb bay doors swung open.

"Ah, so they're using those now? How unfortunate." said Jacqueline as she and Kahfka observed the aerial weapons of war approach their entrenched troops surrounding the capital, dropping a large majority of their payload when they reached their targets. However, before the firebombs could even reach the ground they struck one invisible barrier in the air and exploded, leaving the ground troops and defensive emplacements below completely unharmed.

"They must have a barrier Teigu set up to shield their soldiers from attacks. The only way we'll be able to gain entry is with a full assault." said Maya as she hopped off her ice horse with Tatsumi and Wave, Akame following behind with Murasame and Yatsufusa hanging from her belt.

"Give the order for all divisions to charge! Get so close they can't use their artillery! We'll handle the Great General and her subordinate if she appears!" bellowed Tatsumi to Thernadiier, who was in the back of the lines atop a mobile platform that gave everyone one a view of the signal flag bearers standing with him. He relayed the message to them and in turn it was broadcasted to the other leaders of the army, the ring's front lines starting to move forward at a slow jog at first.

When the airships ceased their fruitless attack and began to retreat at the same time as the ground troops began their advance, Jacqueline glanced back at Kahfka and nod her head, the assassin grinning as she raised both hands up and closed her eyes.

A few meters before the trenches their soldiers were dug into the ground suddenly exploded, revealing several dug out out tunnels that from within emerged the heavily armored Ice Calvary Kahfka had manifested the day before. Their appearance caused a wave of surprise and terror to ripple out among the rebel army forces, but with a grin on his face Tatsumi leaped ahead of the main charge towards the oncoming enemy and laughed.

"Maya, Wave! Let's show them what for!" he exclaimed, the other two armor users coming up on other side of him with their weapons drawn.

"You got it!"

"Let's break 'em to pieces!"

At the same time they all announced their Teigu's name and in sequential order Imperator, Grand Chariot, and Tyrannus came to life around their wielders, the three variants of Tyrant manifesting behind them and each letting loose a defeating roar to broadcast their arrival on the battlefield. Tatsumi and Wave summoned their spears and with several slices they tore apart the first two Ice Cavalry soldiers with ease, while Maya launched her lance into the forehead of a third and slammed her heels into the chest of a fourth, destroying them instantly.

Five other Ice Cavalry surrounded them and charged with their ice and bone enhanced lances, but before they got close Esdeath dropped down from above and created several pillars of ice that impaled the soldiers and stopped their advance cold.

"Can't let you guys have all the fun." was her explanation for her sudden appearance, but they didn't have time to drag out the conversation.

"Here comes some more!" said Akame as she drew Murasame from its sheath, the five of them circling up when the Ice calvary diverted their attention from the advancing enemy army to them in particular.

 **\- Imperial Palace -**

The Emperor was led by Honest down into the lowest depths of the Imperial Palace, the Prime Minister opening a pair of heavy iron doors in order to lead the child into a massive domed room, the walls lined with shiny black plates of what seemed to be obsidian. In the center of the room was a throne situated at the top of a large pedestal-like structure, and with a tiny nudge the Prime Minister moved the Emperor towards it with a smile on his face.

"According to the messenger, Great General Jacqueline and the others are currently holding the enemy at bay." said Honest, the Emperor nodding his head.

"Good. I'd expect nothing less from her."

"But we cannot rest back on our heels. Let us at least be prepared."

The Emperor gripped his ceremonial staff tightly and stared deep into the blue orb built into it, a strange energy beginning to radiate out of it the closer he got to the throne.

"Yes...it is indeed time. The Supreme Teigu…"

"Without the blood of the Great Emperor, the power of that Teigu cannot be unleashed. Which means no other human is capable of using it." said Honest before he held his arms behind his back and nodded once at the Emperor. "It's up to you to save this Empire from destruction, your Highness."

The child Emperor closed his eyes and remembered his parents, and of the treachery the Prime Minister had committed by killing them with poison. He kept his anger under wraps and put his faith into Jacqueline so that he could put all of his focus into the here and now, the defense of his kingdom.

"All right! It's time for my first battle." he said before he strided up to the throne, the Prime Minister feigning awe and joy.

"Splendid, your Highness. How heroic. Our benevolent Lord truly shines in our most perilous moment! Even from behind, you are the spitting image of your late father, the previous Emperor."

The child Emperor stopped for a moment and dropped his smile for a fraction of a second, the Prime Minister's fake emotions striking a chord inside of him that caused his anger to show itself once more. However, he didn't let the politician's words affect him, and continued walking forward until he arrived at the large throne where inside the large seat rested a smaller pedestal with a cut out hole in the center of its top face.

He gripped his staff tightly and raised it high above his head, his eyes shooting wide open before he inserted the tool into the hole. Instantly a bright red glow emerged from the floor around him as an ancient device began to activate and come to life, heavy groans sounding off from beneath their very feet and all around them. While The Emperor was totally awed by the very power emerging from the ancient device, the Prime Minister was smiling maliciously from behind when his mind drifted off to the near future.

" _Your majesty...as long as you listen to and follow every word I saw, I'll be sure to take excellent care of you. So go on and keep working your little ass off!_ "

The floor plates around the pedestal began to shift and move around, and when the Emperor looked down from his higher position he could see something massive start to take shape and appear beneath them, his eyes widening in both shock and fear when an obscene amount of information began too enter his mind.

"T-The control manual...it's...the Supreme Teigu...this is unbelievable!" he stuttered, another explosive release of energy emerging from below and blowing back his hair. "This weapon…! This weapon might destroy humanity itself! It's too dangerous!"

On the outside he continued to put on the facade of still being a naive ruler, but within himself he already knew just how mighty and powerful the Supreme Teigu was when compared to the other forty seven. He knew that with its power he could wipe out the resistance that threatened his kingdom in an instant, but he must be careful not to use it and destroy his subjects.

"That is precisely the reason why your majesty must wield it with your wisdom! We cannot end the Great Empire that has lasted for one thousand years!" yelled Honest at the top of his lungs, the Emperor looking at him for a few seconds before he closed his eyes and relinquished his fake fear.

" _Father, Mother...please give me the power to save this Empire!_ " he screamed in his mind, the floor plates beneath him finally giving away and allowing a domineering mechanical head with glowing red eyes to appear from the darkness.

 **\- Outskirts of Imperial Capital -**

Above ground, the battle to breach the walls of the city had taken another drastic turn when the Jaegers finished off the last of the Ice Calvary and stormed the lines of Imperial Soldiers itself, Jacqueline watching from above with a stoic expression alongside Kahfka. She could feel at this time that the Supreme Teigu had been activated, which meant now was the time to draw in her prey and commence the next step of her plan.

"Kahfka, I'll be taking my leave now. Use the technique, and then act at your own discretion." she ordered before turning around and leaving the wall, Kahfka stepping forward to take her spot so that she had a clear view of the battlefield before the main gate.

She inhaled deeply through her nostrils and mustered up as much of her strength as she could, her eyes glowing slightly alongside the red markings on her body. She clasped her hands together and intertwined her fingers, the power gathered inside of her reaching its breaking point.

"Everest Aufstieg!" she bellowed at the top of her lungs, Esdeath and Tatsumi wrenching their heads back and looking up at the wall when they heard the technique name.

All of a sudden, just like when Esdeath had used her defensive wall technique early, the ground began to shake and rumble. Only, there was no wall that emerged from the earth...instead, massive, razor sharp horns of ice several hundred feet wide in diameter erupted out off the dirt and rose up high into the sky within the midst of the rebel army, killing tens of thousands of soldiers in a matter of seconds. Tatsumi grabbed onto Esdeath and held onto tightly as he threw himself to the right when an ice pillar appeared directly beneath their feet, Maya and Wave doing the same in order to avoid behind caught by the devastating attack.

"That other Demon's Extract user must've created a new Trump Card!" said Esdeath once she was set back down by Tatsumi, the others meeting back up with them.

"Guys, if I were you, I'd go ahead and infiltrate the capital. We can handle things out here!" said Wave after cutting his way through a grouping of Imperial soldiers, Akame right behind him.

"Are you sure?" questioned Tatsumi, Maya nodding her head once and laughing.

"Do you really doubt us that much? That hurts."

They shared a laugh before they excused themselves for the battle under the cover of the chaos and made it over the wall, cutting their way past any soldiers they encountered as they made their way towards the Imperial Palace. With them gone, Wave let out a sigh of relief and allowed the draconian power flowing through him to emerge, even though he knew that if he did the end of his life could would come even sooner. He could already feel Tyrant's presence inside of his very soul become stronger and stronger, as if the Danger Beast was slowly encircling him with his razor-sharp claws, ready to clamp down and crush his existence for good.

At that moment he felt an extremely vile aura come racing toward him and he brought his spear up just in time to block an ice sword held by Kahfka, the assassin grinning madly at him as she rode by him on the back of an ice horse. He spun around and noticed she was heading right for the location of Thernadier, and with a growl he reared his version of Neuntote back and swung with all his might, the blade's shaft extending out many times past its limit and sweeping itself through the legs of the horse.

"You think I'll just let you past me like that?!" he bellowed, Kahfka leaping off the crippled horse and digging her left foot deep into the dirt.

"You'll pay for getting in my way!" she replied before she propelled herself like a screaming bullet, a second ice sword forming in her other hand while Wave brought back Neuntote to its original length and readied himself for her assault.

Their weapons clanged against one another and Wave pushed past her defenses with brute force, Kahfka's grin widening as she flipped in the air and summoned several large ice boulders that she sent barreling at him. He parried and deflected the first couple, but even with his enhanced speed and durability he was unable to defend himself against the sheer number of projectiles she was sending his way, and soon enough he grunted when one of the boulders struck his shoulder and knocked him off balance.

"You've gotten an upgrade since the last time we met! This is sure to be an exciting battle!" exclaimed Kahfka ecstatically before she dropped her ice swords and completely encased her right arm in ice.

"Kalt Grausamkeit!"

Wave's eyes widened when the ice spear shot out at him and he reacted quickly by dropping his spear and using both hands to catch and stop it dead in its tracks. Unfortunately, he had played right into Kahfka's trap and in a matter of seconds she redirected Demon's Extract to her other hand and tightened it into a fist, an aura of evil sprouting from within her very soul.

"Ausführung." she said darkly, the two hemispheres of ice associated with the certain-kill technique emerging from the earth on either side of Wave and closing shut around him.

However, instead of crushing him flat, an explosion of power emerged from the armor when a pair of large dragon wings sprouted from his back and slammed into the ice blocks, slowing them down just enough for him to let go of the ice spear and smash both of his fists into them in order to stop them completely.

Wave let out a heavy grunt at the second forced evolution to gain the wings he now had, but he pushed aside the tiredness in his limbs and the dark essence in his brain in order to concentrate on the enemy before him.

"You won't be able to kill me so easily!" he roared, his voice morphing near the end into that of a dragon's before he rushed Kahfka again, picking up his spear along the way, and swung at her throat with the large blade. "I'll kill you for killing our friends!"

 **\- Imperial Capital Interior -**

Jacqueline made it to the Imperial Palace in good time and quickly summoned a small platoon of Faceless to her side, one of them bringing up and arm that was equipped with a strange gauntlet device featuring multiple buttons.

"All of the devices and traps are set, Great General. Unlimited Odds: Gamemaker is fully operational." stated the Faceless stoically.

"Good, activate all of them and set them to motion detection." she ordered as they entered the palace itself, a vicious smile appearing on her face. "Let's see how they compete with an entire city that's riddled top to bottom with lethal traps!"

Meanwhile, a few hundred feet away from the main gate, Esdeath, Tatsumi and Akame had just finished tearing apart a courtyard full of artillery pieces, and with them out of the way it was time to head for the Imperial Palace on the most direct route possible. Akame took one step forward and gasped when the stone underneath her feet gave way, Esdeath reacting quickly to the sound of rushing air by creating a wall of ice around her to protect them all against a storm of bullets fired from the alleyways on either side. Once they stopped firing Esdeath got rid of the wall and noticed the gun emplacements that had emerged from notches built into the street and buildings, and once Tatsumi and Akame saw them they too realized a terrifying thought.

"There could be traps like that set throughout the capital. Jacqueline must've had these prepared weeks in advance before our arrival." said Tatsumi after they leaped to the top of a nearby building and waited for a few moments to gather themselves and figure out a new strategy for reaching the palace.

An explosion drew their attention towards the south gate and they guessed the Imperial forces on that side had failed, meaning they were now inside the city walls and flooding in to take over the capital from the inside out.

"Our forces will be caught by these traps unless we figure out the device that's controlling them and destroy it." said Esdeath with a frown, but her frustration quickly passed when she snapped her fingers and created an ice dragon for them to ride on. "Come on, we have no time to lose."

 **\- Main Gate, Capital Defensive Wall -**

Wave and Kahfka's battle was growing ever fiercer the more time passed by, the two combatants now hammering away at one another with some of their strongest attacks. Kahfka avoided a swipe from Wave's spear and landed a punch to his rib cage, but he merely brushed off the blow and pushed her back with a punch of his own.

" _I need more speed...more power!_ " he thought, his armor granting him those wishes as he traded blows with his enemy.

Kahfka was astounded by him seemingly gaining power as their weapons crossed, and with a laugh she crouched down and used her secondary Trump Card, creating several massive ice pillars that joined together to make a mountain sized ice block that sent Wave flying high up into the sky. He recovered quickly thanks to his wings, but had little time to breath easy when he had to slice his way through a storm of icicles fired up at him from below by Kahfka.

Thanks to this she was able to run up the face of the ice mountain and leap up toward her opponent, catching him off guard and landing a devastating axe kick that sent him barreling down like a rocket through the ice and into the ground under it.

"Come on now, that's not all you got! Get back on your feet!" yelled Kahfka excitedly, her taunt met with another roar from Wave as he broke through the ice and clenched his hands tightly around his spear.

"That's it, now bring it!"

"With pleasure! Guillotine Drop!"

Kahfka only had a split second to look up and see who was coming before rolling to the side to avoid Maya, Wave grinning behind his helmet at her explosive entrance that sent chunks of dirt flying everywhere.

"Took you long enough." joked Wave as he hunched over a bit and let himself rest a few, Maya leaping to his side and glaring at him while rolling her eyes.

"Mhm, sure, whatever. Go ahead and take a break, deactivate Grand Chariot. I'll handle her now for you."

"That's a negative…" replied Wave, his response causing her to now stare back at him with wide eyes. "Truth be told...I feel a lot better with it on...so...comfortable…"

" _Damn...he's displaying signs...the fusion has begun. He doesn't have long until Grand Chariot consumes him…_ "

"But...I guess I can take it off for a few seconds…"

Wave deactivated Grand Chariot and Maya gasped in horror at how bad his degradation from a human into Tyrant's dragon body had become, with his hair becoming a darker shade of blue and the horns he had grown earlier on now back and slightly longer then when they first appeared. His body had gained even more scales, this time on the back of his hands and neck, and he was already starting to feel his psyche slowly slip away...turning into something far more dark and sinister.

" _No...I need to stay...as myself…_ " he thought before he clenched his hand tighter around Grand Chariot's key and cloaked himself in the armor once again.

He stood next to Maya and raised his spear and she her lance, the duo staring down Kahfka and preparing themselves to go all out. She looked left and right, seeing that along with them the whole entirety of the enemy army had surrounded her and were waiting for the opportune moment to strike, but before she could make a decision the deafening echo of a gong rang out across the battlefield.

She grinned and dematerialized the ice swords she had created, Wave and Maya becoming confused for a few seconds when she bowed a little toward them and laughed.

"I really would like to stay, but I have something important to attend to. Let's meet again soon!"

With that she formed an ice horse and ran back the way she came, racing up and over the wall before disappearing beyond it into the city's interior. Maya and Wave let out a sigh of relief and they relaxed for a few seconds while the soldier behind them cheered at their victory.

"With her out of the way, and Jacqueline most likely somewhere in the city directing the whole operation, all we need to do is finish them off and this war will be over. Even retreating now to defend the palace is a…" Maya started to say before she gasped, Wave looking at her with wide eyes when he had the same realization.

"Oh no...they're going to use it, the Supreme Teigu. That's why they would pull back all of a sudden!"

"We need to get word to Thernadier and the others fast!"

 **\- Imperial Palace -**

Upon the arrival of Tatsumi, Esdeath and Akame at the palace, the grounds had been turned into a bloody wasteland littered with the bodies of the Imperial Guards and Faceless who had challenged them. They cut their way through the waves of enemies and broke into the palace, being met with even stiffer resistance, but still they pushed on toward the throne room.

"Down here!" shouted Esdeath while motioning with her arm to a hallway on their right, Tatsumi and Akame following right behind her.

She froze anyone that jumped in their path, and if any stragglers managed to avoid such a frosty fate, Akame would either cut them down with Murasame or Tatsumi would cleave them in two with Neuntote. Finally they reached the white marble hall directly before the throne room and, strangely, there were no guards whatsoever. It was barren and utterly silent, which raised all of the red flags for them as they slowly approached the doors with their weapons at the ready in case they were ambushed by some unseen enemy from some unknown location.

"Let's finish this." said Akame in a low tone when they arrived, Tatsumi rearing back and busting down the doors with a single punch.

They strolled inside and came to stand a few yards away from the one person they all hated more in the world for what he had done to an entire nation and its people, that very same person whirling around with a frightened expression on his face.

"Esdeath?! You're here?!" he stammered, the former General grinning as she brought her rapier up until its point was aimed at him.

"Long time, no see, Prime Minister."

"It's high time you atoned for your crimes against the Empire and its people, Honest." snarled Tatsumi, his killer intent powerful enough to turn Honest into a blubbering mess.

Akame took a few steps forward and leaped at Honest, Murasame poised to cut his throat and finally bring an end to this fight once and for all, but instead of hitting skin, the sword struck an invisible barrier that threw her back to where Tatsumi and Esdeath were standing. She growled when the Prime Minister's shocked look dissolved into a cheeky smile as he laughed at them, the shimmering barrier that had been revealed by her attack fading away.

"You stupid fools, as long as I'm within this barrier, you can't harm me. So all I have to do is wait for reinforcements that will deal with you all so that I can get rid of that pesky army outside."

"Well, I guess I got here at the right time then."

Honest turned around and chuckled happily while Tatsumi, Esdeath and Akame tensed up as Jacqueline appeared from behind the throne and leaned up against it, her gaze coming to rest upon them. She had shed her trench coat and revealed that she was dressed in an entirely new outfit, consisting of a black velvet choker around her neck, a unique battle dress with red arm warmers and black stockings, a shoulder guard and finger claws on each of the fingers on her left hand.

"Ah, Great General, you are indeed right on time. If you could please dispose of the trash, I would very much appreciate it." said Honest as he turned to face Tatsumi and company again, the smug grin on his face causing them to get even angrier.

"Of course...Prime Minister."

Honest waited for her to leap over him and engage the three in a fight to the death, but he gasped when something sharp rammed itself through the back of his calf and into the floor, his eyes dropping to see a sharpened bone rod protruding through his boot.

Esdeath, Tatsumi and Akame were totally floored as they watched Jacqueline return to her original height after throwing the bone rod right through her target and giggled, Honest dropping to a knee in pain when he tried to pull the weapon out of his leg.

"What is the meaning of this?!" he sputtered, Jacqueline pushing a lock of her hair over her ear while her grin turned into a scowl.

"Shut up, you fat old fool." she snarled, her attitude quickly turning the whole situation on its head.

"Jacqueline, what are you doing?" asked Esdeath, the Great General looking back at her and smiling again.

"Something that I've been waiting to do for a very, _very_ long time. You see, I've been making plans...and what's going on all around us is the culmination of it all. The end game, basically."

"Planning? Just what exactly do you mean by that?"

Jacqueline casually walked down the steps of the throne until she was on the same level as them and Honest, her vile killer intent making itself known the closer she got to the politician.

"Well, allow me all to tell you a little secret of mine. The Four Rakshasa Demons weren't killed by Night Raid, and Bolic wasn't assassinated by Akame." she started off, Honest looking back at her with wide eyes as she laughed again. "That was a feat accomplished by my Inquisitor alone, after I ordered him to of course."

" _You_ were the one that killed them? Why?!" demanded Honest, but he was quickly shut up when Jacqueline rammed her pointed heel into the back of his hand.

"There's more, so stay quiet until I finish. Anyways, there was one more person I had to kill in order to gain the position I hold today, and lo and behold, I was granted a little bit of luck when a certain former superior of mine went rogue with the organization she was a part of and grievously injures my target…"

Esdeath's jaw dropped open at the same time as Tatsumi's when they realized who she was talking about, and in a split second the truth dawned on them. Somehow Budo must've survived the detonation of Rubicante, and to finish him off, Jacqueline had ordered the Inquisitor to kill him and make it appear as though the explosion itself had been the one to end his life.

"And so when he was out of the way, I gained the power to do whatever I wanted and influence several events that led up to this day." finished Jacqueline.

"Why? Why kill so many agents of the Empire and assassinate Budo? Why do all of this?!" asked Tatsumi, the Great General fixing her gaze on him as she removed her heel from Honest's hand and got rid of her smile again.

"So I could watch this damned nation _burn_." she said darkly.

"W-What?" stammered Akame in shock, Jacqueline's anger going through the roof as she crossed her arms and glared down at the Prime Minister.

"Yes...I hate this rotten nation to the core. All because of what _you_ did to me. What you ordered to be done."

She rammed her heel into Honest's other hand and relished the cry of pain from the Prime Minister, her true colors coming out into the light as she revealed the truth behind all of her plotting and scheming. Tatsumi and Esdeath could only try to imagine just what kind of event the Prime Minister had orchestrated to cause Jacqueline to go to such great lengths to arrive at an all out attack on the Imperial Capital, while Akame could only look on in silence and awe.

"I-I don't know what you're talking about…" muttered Honest, but the response only gave him more agony as Jacqueline twisted her heel deeper into his hand and drew blood.

"You may not remember, but what I experienced can never be forgotten. You ordered the burning of my entire home town because they refused to pay the outrageous taxes you set up. Everyone I knew and cared about were burned, turned to ash." said Jacqueline, who was now on the verge of tears as all of the painful memories of her childhood came rushing back to her. "I watched my own parents die before my very eyes, I watched the skin melt off their faces from the fire and, when I finally woke up after all of the carnage had ended...all that remained were their charred and blackened skeletons."

Honest tried to remove his hand from under her heel and she quickly kicked him in the face, laying his body out on the ground and bruising his cheek. She then uncoiled Basilisk from her belt and with the flick of a wrist she wrapped the bone sword around his neck and hoisted him up onto his knees, a single tear falling down her cheek as she looked deeply into the eyes of the one person she hated more then anyone else in the world.

"From that day, I swore I would kill you. I took every step to ensure I would be able to kill you and destroy this damned nation. Killing Budo and the Four Rakshasa Demons, ensuring that every army aside from my own lost against the Eastern Nation after forcing them to declare war, and even gaining the allegiance of the Faceless so that they wouldn't interfere." listed off Jacqueline as she tightened Basilisk's grip around Honest's throat, the serrated teeth digging into his skin and making it harder and harder for him to breath.

"And now, I've played my final card. The Supreme Teigu shall lay waste to this city and turn it into a crater, and there's nothing you can do to stop me!"

With a harsh tug Jacqueline pulled Basilisk's coil around Honest's neck and shredded his skin, spraying blood this way and that until it reached bone, where after grinding its way through his spine, Honest's headless corpse dropped to the floor while his head itself came down next to it. She hardened Basilisk and swept the blade to the side, getting rid of the blood on it while licking away the droplets that had landed on her cheeks and hands.

Before Esdeath, Tatsumi and Akame could react, the entire palace rumbled and suddenly the floor and walls began to crack and split, Jacqueline raising her hands up and grinning at them all with a mad expression. Dust and smoke consumed the entire throne room as the Imperial Palace began to crumble all around them, the two Jaegers and Akame acting quickly to leave the building before they got trapped under the rubble and flee to the protective wall surrounding the estate.

Tatsumi and Esdeath didn't stop running until they were well away from the palace estate wall, and when he felt his feet touch solid ground Tatsumi let go of Akame and turned to look back with Esdeath in order to see what had become of the Imperial Palace. What they saw however was something nightmarish in every aspect of the word.

Towering over the palace grounds, and the very Imperial Capital itself, was a titanic suit of armor dressed in the garb of the Emperor, crown and all, with billowing cape with a high collar that framed either side of its head, and covering its shoulders were two pauldrons line with gold. Its chest was protected with huge plates of armor as well as its legs and abdomen, but what scared them even more was the giant disk that appeared when the chest pieces of its armor slid apart, and the red glow it gave off.

With a deafening boom of the sound barrier getting broken, the disk let loose a huge beam of red energy that flew over the Imperial Capital and struck the lines of their allies just outside the defensive wall, turning everyone and everything it touched into nothing but ash and dust. A massive scar was left behind in the beam's wake, and everyone who had seen the devastating attack was left in a state of pure shock, unable to think or move.

"Magnificent! Truly magnificent!" exclaimed Jacqueline from her position on the wall, which was only a few meters away from the left leg of massive contraption. "This is the Empire's Trump Card, the very origin and pinnacle of all, the Guardian of the Thousand-Year old Empire! The Supreme Teigu, Imperial Guardian: Shikoutazer!"

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A/N For those who need translations

Arktis Bastei - Arctic Bastion

Everest Aufstieg - Everest Rise


	45. Battle of Titans

A/N And, ladies and gentlemen, allow me to say that the shit has hit the fan at Mach 2. The Shikoutazer has finally made its appearance, and like I've stated, Jacqueline's true colors have been revealed. So, now I bring upon the question many of you must have or will might think on now that this event has occurred. Should Jacqueline die because of all the horrible things she has committed throughout this story thus far, or, maybe, is there a chance that her soul can still be saved? Should she live, or should she die? After this chapter goes up, I'm going to create a new poll that I hope **EVERYONE ACTUALLY CONTRIBUTES TO** that asks this same question. Once again, the link will be on my profile, just go there and it will be at the top. **DO IT**.

In other news, I have two things to say. One is that I recently finished watching Clannad and Clannad After Story. Nothing, in the history of anime, has ever been THAT FUCKING SAD. **MY HEART AND SOUL ARE DEAD AND GONE, SHATTERED INTO AN INFINITE AMOUNT OF PIECES.** I highly, HIGHLY recommend watching then both of you havn't, just be forewarned...YOU WILL NEED A BOX OF TISSUES WITH YOU.

Okay, now onto the second piece of news. Guys, my people, I have reached an ultimatum. It's going to happen. A Different Path will receive a sequel, only instead of an entirely separate story, I shall modify this one slightly to where everything that has and will transpire to chapter 50, the intended stopping point, shall be made into "Part 1", and the sequel will become "Part 2", labeled "Ancient Resurgence". So guys, this story is not going to end for a LOOOOOOONG TIME now! Be excited, because this shit is coming in at Mach 3! Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 44 - Battle of Titans**

The Shikoutazer's chest plates slid back into place and let out a heavy metallic groan as all of its inner machinery relaxed, its pilot focusing on the rebel army before it and narrowing his eyes. The Emperor levitated in a glass bubble filled with a strange translucent blue liquid that he could breath and talk in, which was attached to a strange-looking pedestal reminiscent of the cerebral cortex for a brain. In a sense, its appearance was fitting due to the fact he was within the head of the giant machine, and he was telepathically controlling the Teigu with his thoughts and actions, which through association he was essentially the brain of the Shikoutazer.

He locked on to another portion of the rebel army surrounding his city and hunched down, several hundred slots on each of the Shikoutazer's shoulder pauldrons opening up. With a rush of air each fired a single missile that lanced out from its launch port in an arch, the lethal projectiles zooming out and over the wall in order to continue to devastate their lines with overwhelming firepower.

" _Yes...just continue to attack them like that, and when the time is right, I'll turn you into the instrument I need to wipe out this entire city._ " thought Jacqueline with a sneer, the Emperor returning to his full height and observing the carnage.

"Pull all airships back! We can't afford to be hit by that monster!" ordered Camilla frantically, the other airships quickly pulling away towards an oncoming bank of dark clouds.

There was going to be a storm soon, thought Wave as he stared at the scene of devastation all around him as a result of the Shikoutazer's initial assault. The thought of something like that even existing was mind-boggling, and he couldn't help but stare in horrified awe. Slowly this sense of terror however transformed into rage, and he only need to glance at Maya once to see that she was feeling the same exact way.

Without a word they broke away from the army's front lines and sprinted towards the main gate, busting them open and running toward what used the be the Imperial Palace.

" _It seems I really will have to use these…_ " thought Wave as he tapped the two disks of Mastema attached to his thighs, the Teigu beginning to hover and move up and around his dragon wings.

" _Run, if you can hear me, please! I need your help! Give me the power to save the people, the people we swore to protect!_ "

Meanwhile Tatsumi was clenching his fists and snarling when the Emperor unleashed another volley of missiles from the Shikoutazer, his anger and rage only fueling his growing power.

" _This...this is no way for any human being to meet their maker!_ "

"Tatsumi, I know what you're thinking."

He looked back at Esdeath and she grinned at him, her rapier shining a little in the sunlight as she motioned with her head to the Shikoutazer. "Go, Akame and I will handle Jacqueline. That thing needs to be stopped."

"Be safe then. I'll be back." he replied darkly before bolting off, Esdeath chuckling to herself as she created her ice wings and glanced at Akame.

They nodded at one another and a platform of ice manifested underneath Akame so that she could be flown alongside the former General to the wall, where they could clearly see their target standing atop it. They were about to reach her when all of a sudden a white blur appeared and knocked them both out of the sky with a huge block of pinkish red ice.

When they recovered after hitting a nearby empty street, they discovered the unknown attacker was Kahfka, and only a few seconds later Jacqueline landed on the cobblestone beside her with Basilisk in hand.

"Jacqueline, you need to stop this. Killing millions of people is not a way to get revenge! You already killed Honest!" yelled Esdeath to try and reason with the Great General, but her plea fell on deaf ears.

"This entire nation needs to burn, just like my home did. I won't let you get in my way!" she snarled before Kahfka and her charged them, Akame ducking to the side and drawing away Kahfka while Esdeath waited for Jacqueline to meet her.

The Emperor got a notification from a floating screen hovering among many others within the control center of the Shikoutazer telling him the missiles were ready to launch again, but before he could a red alert sounded off and he looked to the sky. Tatsumi shot out from a nearby smoke cloud with Neuntote held back menacingly, his killer intent through the roof. "Stop firing a weapon you've got no business using!"

" _He's come flying in all by himself?! What a fool!_ " thought the Emperor as he opened the Shikoutazer's mouth and began to charge up a smaller disk located within it.

He fired a solid red sphere of energy that struck Tatsumi dead on in his spear when he used it to protect himself, and he was thrown back for a good while until he yelled and deflected the sphere up and over his head. With that out of the way he continued his free-fall toward the SHikoutazer, the Emperor lunging at him with one of its massive fists with a frown on his face.

"Just who the hell are you?!" he demanded, Tatsumi tightening his right fist and snarling as he leaped off the Shikoutazer's bicep.

"I'm the guy who's gonna bring you _down_!" roared Tatsumi at the top of his lungs as he smashed his fist into the red crystal built into the Shikoutazer's forehead.

The Emperor grunted when the force of the blow actually managed to throw the massive armored Teigu off balance, a quick repositioning of its feet allowing it to come to a screeching halt and grow closer to the wall protecting the palace grounds.

"This cannot be! The Supreme Teigu...shaken to its very core by one simple punch?!"

"Your majesty!"

He turned a little within the glass bubble and opened up another screen, which zoomed in on Jacqueline after she had called out to him while in the midst of her duel with Esdeath.

"Dot not let a mere fly hold its own against your incomparable might! A fly should be swatted down, just like the pest it is!" she called out to him before she ducked under a swipe from Esdeath's rapier and attacked her with Basilisk.

As their blades crossed one another, she started to think of the final step in her plan in using the Shikoutazer to her advantage. The Shikoutazer was most definitely powerful, more powerful then any other Teigu, but at this rate they would never get to chance to unleash its full arsenal and complete her endgame.

" _Enough fooling around...the time has come to use the Shikoutazer's Trump Card!_ "

 **\- New Kannath, Western Nations -**

 **\- Five Hours Earlier -**

"Leone, I'm telling you, we must go help out the others! Sitting her do nothing is not the way to go." pleaded Arthur of Leone, who was sitting on a bench in the courtyard just outside the Parliamentary Building drinking a bottle of sake.

"I already told you, I'm done. I don't care any more…" she said before taking another long sip from the bottle and hiccuping.

Arthur growled in frustration at her inability to listen to reason, but instead of allowing his emotions to dictate his actions, he eet out a deep breath and kneeled down before the lioness. He made sure that he had her full attention and stared directly into her eyes, Leone bringing the bottle away from her lips when she saw the look in his and the fire that burned in them.

"Leone, listen to me. Your friends are going to risking their lives to accomplish a goal many have speculated to be impossible. Sitting here and doing nothing is an insult to those who have already made the ultimate sacrifice to try and see this goal to its end." he said harshly, the statement causing a spark to go off inside of her.

"Shut up…"

"I'm sorry, but right now, you're acting like a disgrace. What would Mine think if she saw you right now, drowning yourself in alcohol in grief?"

"I said shut the fuck up!" snarled Leone, Arthur standing up and taking advantage of his height to tower over her and force her to hear his point.

"If I were you, Leone, I would take the death of beloved comrades as a way to get me to push on even harder then before, to push on and try to prevent any more unjust deaths from occurring. I can already tell that with this attack on the Imperial Capital, a lot of innocent people are going to die. Didn't you join Night Raid in order to protect the people from those oppressing them?"

Leone's anger vanished almost instantaneously and she lowered her gaze, the grip around the sake battle slackening to the point Arthur could take it from her and set it on the ground next to his foot. Now that he had her undivided attention, his demeanor softened and he placed a hand gingerly on her shoulder to comfort her after tearing her apart with his words.

"Even before Mine died, there were many others who had perished and yet you all still carried on, regardless of the grief or sorrow you all felt." he said before he offered a hand to Leone. "Now come on, if we are to participate we need to leave quickly."

Leone looked up at him for a few seconds before her lips quivered slightly and she smiled, the lioness standing up and sighing heavily to wash away the sadness in her heart and soul.

"Thanks, Arthur...I needed that. Let's go."

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

 **\- Current Time -**

Leone closed her eyes and sighed a little as the memory faded away, her attention returning to their goal of figuring out where Solomon was within the capital and rescuing him as soon as possible. They had been informed of the situation by Fiona and Rafe when they had arrived at the Shisuikan an hour earlier, but they really had no idea how bad it was until they came to the capital itself and saw the titanical suit of armor towering over the city and laying waste to their forces while a single blur tried to fight it.

Upon seeing it, Arthur made the assumption that it was in fact the Supreme Teigu he had talked of earlier when telling them about the Six Armors Series, that this was none other then the Imperial Guardian: Shikoutazer. They could only hope that Tatsumi and the others could bring it down before it could cause any more damage.

"Okay, Arthur, where do you think Solomon would be?"

Meanwhile the Shikoutazer hunched over and let out another long groan as steam escaped from its joints, the Emperor glaring angrily at Tatsumi from across the Imperial Palace grounds. He barred his teeth and growled in frustration, the thought of only one person actually managing to hold off the Supreme Teigu swirling around in his mind and clouding his better judgement.

"How dare you...retaliating against me like this...just _who_ the hell...are you?!" he demanded again, Tatsumi remaining silent. "Do you not feel fear and despair?! You're facing the Supreme Teigu!"

" _I can tell he's confused and flustered by the fact I've decided to face him head on, and it's clear he hasn't fully mastered his Teigu either...I just need to keep him at bay long enough for Rafe and Fiona to lock onto him with Hræsvelgr._ " Tatsumi thought to himself with a small grin, his curiosity on what exactly the siege weapon could do making itself known since he had never seen it before.

Unfortunately for him, a wrench was thrown in his plan when out of the corner of his eye he noticed Jacqueline hop up onto the top of a building and cup her hands around her mouth.

"Shikoutazer! Activate Trump Card!" she ordered with a booming voice, the giant suit of armor freezing up instantly.

All of a sudden an even louder metallic groan emanated from the Shikoutazer and its eyes glowed brightly, Tatsumi gasping when a dark, yet familiar, aura emerged from the center of the Teigu and washed over him.

Within the Shikoutazer's head the Emperor was wondering why the Teigu had stopped moving when he heard something hiss behind him. He turned and noticed a valve built into the foundation the glass orb was on slide open, and from within it floated out a cloud of dark red that disseminated throughout the liquid quickly.

"What's going on?! What is the meaning of this?" he demanded in a half authoritative, half nervous tone as the red liquid closed in on him.

Jacqueline lowered her hands and grinned evilly as her plan came into fruition before her very eyes, the sight of most if not all of the armor of the Shikoutazer slowly crumbling and breaking off in huge troves to reveal a horrifying monster underneath.

"I'm sorry, but that kind-hearted nature of yours just won't do. Which is why I thought ahead and prepared a little _something_ to help you out…"

The last piece of armor fell from its chest to reveal the disk built into it and the Shikoutazer lowered itself down a little, Tatsumi gazing up in absolute terror at the monstrosity the Teigu had turned into when from its back through cuts and tears in its cape grew out two absolutely massive wings made of pure blood that blanketed the sky.

Its armor revealed dark red flesh-infused metal muscles and limbs, the tips of its fingers had accumulated claws, and from its lower back had grown a long segmented tail reminiscent of a dragon's. Crimson red eyes glowered within the eyeholes of its face, and out of its forehead had emerged two horns that completed its demonic transformation from a mere suit of armor to a true nightmare.

"The perfect synthesis of alchemy and Teigu...Purge Mode!" proclaimed Jacqueline to the entire city, the Shikoutazer letting out a defeating roar while inside of its head the Emperor fully inhaled the red liquid through his nostrils and mouth, much like air.

His eyes widened a fraction of an inch before his pupils dulled and he gained a stoic, emotionless expression as the red blood-like liquid fully diluted into the original liquid. He exhaled slowly and looked down on the city through the eyes of the Shikoutazer, his hand's grip tightening around his scepter.

"You fools who dared to oppose the Great Empire…" he began to say, his whole speech and demeanor fully conforming to the chemicals added to the blood. "As the ruler of this land...I shall reign down my judgement upon all of you!"

He slammed the Shikoutazer's clawed hand onto the ground and from its shoulders and back launched hundreds of thousands of missiles, the projectiles zooming out to every corner of the Imperial Capital and striking the first building or street they locked onto. Tatsumi's shoulders slumped and he observed with wide eyes as various sections of the city went up in flames, the screams of the people consumed by the explosions filling the air. There were even Imperial Soldiers, loyal men and women who served the Emperor, who were injured or killed in the attack.

"She's intent on killing everyone here...there's not even a regard for collateral damage…" he murmured before he noticed a bright flash in the sky above them, and he knew that it wasn't lightning.

From above several large beams of red energy lanced down like it was an attack from some divine being and struck he Shikoutazer dead-on, knocking it back several hundred feet even closer to the wall built around the Imperial Palace grounds. Tatsumi gained a sense of hope when he realized that the attack could only have come from Fiona and Rafe at the Shisuikan, and he urged for them to fire Hræsvelgr again, but when the smoke cleared he could see that it was going to take a lot more then just a couple of shots from the siege weapon.

The Emperor growled and after taking a few seconds to calculate the trajectory of the beam attack he grinned maliciously when he determined the precise location. The Shikoutazer leaned back and from the disk built into its chest, a dark red orb of energy began to manifest and grow larger and larger as it accumulated and charged up more power.

"Behold, the new light will shine over the masses and bless our thousand-year old Empire!"

"STOP!" yelled Tatsumi, but his plea did nothing to stop the Emperor from firing the now almost pitch black orb straight over the city and far off into the distance.

Esdeath had leaped up onto the same building Jacqueline was standing on to engage her once again, but she was stopped dead in her tracks when the orb reached its target...the Shisuikan. A bright flash of light filled up the entire sky when the orb detonated first as a massive dome of energy that fully consumed the fortress and Hræsvelgr, and then immediately afterwards the sphere grew infinitely bigger and stretched high into the sky as it took the shape of a large cone.

After they witness the explosion, a rush of wind created from the shockwave blew over the battlefield and capital, coupled with a thunderous boom that drowned out any other sound made from the land.

The Emperor could only smile as he observed the work of destructive art he had created slowly fade away into nothingness, and on the ground Jacqueline turned away from the demonic creature and stared at Esdeath with a grin.

" _This is the ultimate Trump Card...the Shikoutazer's Purge Mode, which until his Highness has exterminated the populace of this city and turned its buildings into rubble, it will never stop._ " she explained, Esdeath's expression morphing to one of pure rage and hate for her enemy.

"You bitch...what did you do to the Emperor…?"

"I merely had someone add in some special chemicals to some of your friends blood to… _alter_ the Emperor's mindset. He believes he's doing right by eliminating the enemy and protecting his nation, but in truth, he's just slaughtering anyone and anything he sees regardless if they're the enemy or his own people."

Suddenly the Emperor's attitude changed once again from pure bliss to anger, the Shikoutazer responding by preparing another attack that he could use with a mere thought.

"How dare you...you filthy vermin...how dare you lay waste to my Father and Mother's precious country…I'll purge this world of you! Down to the very last one!"

"OPEN YOUR FUCKING EYES, YOU CLUELESS BASTARD!" snarled Tatsumi as he flew up from the ground towards the Shikoutazer's head, the Emperor finally taking notice of him and sighing.

"Ahhh...I totally forgot about you…"

He swung at Tatsumi with one of the Shikoutazer's hands, but the smaller and more agile Jaeger easily ducked under it and rammed his fist into the Teigu'ss cheek, which only served to aggravate the Emperor even more.

"You really are starting to get on my nerves…" he growled as he unleashed another huge barrage of missiles after Tatsumi.

He twisted and turned through the air during his descent to avoid the missiles, which worried him greatly when they began to explode around him instead of doing so on contact. He used Neuntote to cut through one that had gotten too close for comfort, and the Emperor watched in slight amusement and waited for an opening to emerge in the Jaeger's defenses.

"With the sheer volume of explosions happening around you...you'll eventually end up leaving yourself unprotected at some point. And when you do, I shall bring you down without fail." he said darkly, Tatsumi grunting heavily when several missiles detonated only a few feet away from him and shook his body down to the very core.

He was entirely focused on ducking and weaving through the seemingly endless wave of lethal projectiles, but upon moving his gaze away from them for a fraction of a second he realized just how close he was to the city. There were so many innocent people below him, with looks of terror on their faces, and so acting purely on instead he stopped and allowed a missile that would have landed in the direct center of the crowd to hit him directly.

The explosion rocked his body again and he spit up some blood within the helmet at the pain, but he smiled weakly and let out a sigh of relief. " _Whew...that was close…_ "

Suddenly a razor-sharp telescoping blade impaled him through his lower back, spraying his blood in all directions before it took him the rest of the way down from the air to the ground. He gasped in agony as his body hit the cobblestone road hard, but regardless of the pain from his spine and rib cage, he forced himself to turn his head and looked back up the blade all the way to its origin.

The telescoping blade had grew itself out of the extended hand of the Shikoutazer, and with a devious laugh the Emperor cocked his head to the right and remarked, "An opening...just as I said!"

Quickly he extracted the blade out of Tatsumi and reared his other hand back, the fingers balling up into a fist poised to strike the Jaeger and end his existence.

"For such a tiny pest, you truly caused me to overexert myself...now, you shall experience first hand the true wrath of this almighty armor! SHIKOUTEN!" bellowed the Emperor as he threw the Teigu's fist forward and down onto Tatsumi.

The sound barrier broke three times over along the fist's trajectory and upon making contact with the ground, an immense amount of smoke, dust and debris was flung up into the air and created a cloud only seen from the largest of volcanic eruptions.

"Execution completed." said the Emperor, but his victory was short lived when several red sirens went off in the Shikoutazer's control center, a flick of the wrist bringing up a screen that showed the view underneath his fists.

What he saw caused him to gasp in shock at how unbelievable it was. The Shikoutazer's fist had in fact not struck the ground, but instead struck the outstretched hands of Wave, who had flown to Tatsumi's side just in the nick of time with the dragon wings sprouting from hiss lower back and the angelic wings turned black of Mastema levitating just above them over each of his shoulders.

"Wave…" murmured Tatsumi weakly, the Jaeger glancing back at him and chuckling while holding back the immense weight of the fist.

"Sorry it took me so long to get here...I was helping escort the people away from the immediate area. I'm not letting you die yet...Esdeath would kill me if I let you die here…" he grunted, Tatsumi's eyes widening when he looked past his friends exterior and felt the essence of him through the armor, seeing that there was barely an ounce of his humanity left and that he was close to being consumed by Grand Chariot.

Wave growled and with a burst of strength he pushed with all his might against the Emperor and the Shikoutazer, who had begun to put more force behind the fist to try and crush them both.

"Guilting Drop!"

"Another pest?!" stammered the Emperor when he detected another presence above him, but before he could react accordingly Maya dropped her foot hard onto the top of the Shikoutazer's head.

The Emperor lost all focus on Wave and Tatsumi as a result of the attack, which allowed the former to push away the fist and help Tatsumi back onto his feet just as Maya landed close to them.

"Tatsumi, here, drink this." she said before tossing him something, the Jaeger catching it and gasping when he opened his hand and saw a vial of Solomon's Phoenix blood resting in it.

"Where did you get this?"

"From Solomon of course, dummy. Turns out Arthur and Leone discovered his location and freed him. Right now they're outside of the wall administering his blood to anyone that's currently injured." explained Maya with a giggle, Tatsumi's eyes widening when he heard Leone's name mentioned.

" _So she did come...Arthur, I have no idea what you said to her, but thank god you were able to get her here and rescue Solomon!_ " he thought before he deactivated Tyrannus so that he could down the contents of the vial and be healed by Solomon's Phoenix blood.

Once all of his injuries had been healed, he summoned Tyrannus once more and manifested Neuntote in his hand. The three of them looked up to the Shikoutazer when the Emperor had finally recovered from Maya's attack, with Tatsumi taking a step forward and glaring specifically into the eyes of the titan.

All of a sudden a familiar presence he hadn't felt in a long time appeared inside of his head, and with a resounding roar a voice spoke, " ** _GOD DAMMIT RUNT! I LEAVE YOU ALONE FOR HOW LONG AND YOU STILL CAN'T HANDLE THINGS ON YOUR OWN?!_** "

" _T-Tyrant?!_ " he sputtered after the Danger Beast made himself known once more, the very fact that he was still alive utterly shocking him. " _I thought you fused yourself to me!_ "

" ** _Yes, most of me! But I'm not stupid enough to fuse my entire being into you and kill myself! But we can talk later, I already know everything that's happened thus far and that you're gonna need a hell of a lot more power to take this thing down._** " explained Tyrant with a growl before he funneled some of the strength he had been accumulating while he had been lying low into Tatsumi.

He gasped when it seemed like an adrenaline rush took over his entire body, and in a few seconds he grinned as dragon wings similar to the ones Wave had exploded out of of his back and flapped a few times while the armor itself began to evolve.

"Tatsumi? What's going on?" asked Maya when she and Wave were both blinded by the light that emerged from Tyrannus as it evolved, the armor growing more bulkier and becoming even closer in design to the Danger Beast it was crafted from.

Once it was completed Tatsumi chuckled and fixed his gaze on her while pointing to the side of his head. "You wouldn't believe who just said hi to me after all this time."

"Who?"

Tatsumi cleared his throat and his sclerare gained a dark grey color as his consciousness was substituted with Tyrant's in order for the Danger Beast to speak to them. " **Who do you think, woman? This runt isn't strong enough to evolve my flesh on his own, so of course I have to come back from the verge of death to help his ass out.** "

Maya was left shocked at the change in tone of voice with Tatsumi, and only after Wave crossed his arms and chuckled did she realize that it was in fact Tyrant who had spoken, not Tatsumi, and that after a few moments she too laughed.

"Nice."

With the banter between them finished, Tyrant returned control of his body back to Tatsumi and he glared up at the Shikoutazer, his newly evolved Teigu glistening in the sun.

"No matter the cost...we will stop you. We won't allow you to kill any more innocent people."

The Emperor clenched his jaw muscles out of anger, the Shikoutazer's hands balling up into fists as he gazed onto the insects before him. "For the honor and dignity of the Emperor...I decreed you to be executed, so I _must_ see it through!"

As he prepared to squash his enemies through any means possible, Tatsumi took a moment to look at Maya and Wave and smile behind his helmet at how even with the odds stacked against them, they still stood united with the ame goal in mind.

"Guys, I just want to say thanks for not leaving me. I'm glad to have known you as friends."

"That's what friends are for. Now from the looks of things, you need some help in bringing down that massive Teigu." said Maya with a smirk when Leomurg materialized along with her wings. "What do you say we show him who's boss?"

While they stared up at the Shikoutazer with their weapons at their sides, the Emperor held a blank expression on his face when the Teigu finished a task he had it do a few seconds earlier. "Short range scan for enemy targets completed...so according to these readings, those three insects are the only one in the immediate area. Two of them are human, but the other is registering as…" he began to say before his eyes widened and his face contorted once again into one filled with hate. "It matters not, I'll crush all three of them! I'll make sure to grind that tenacious struggle out of your bones once and for all!"

The Emperor raised the Shikoutazer's right foot up and attempted to slam it down on Tatsumi, Wave, and Maya, but the three easily flew away from the impact zone with their wings and took to the skies. Wave flew straight for the head of the monstrous Teigu and slammed his feet into its lower jaw, wrenching its head backward and seemingly doing some damage to it, however the Emperor disproved this assumption when he and the Shikoutazer recovered quickly after the blow.

"Not even a scratch!" he proclaimed as he fired missiles from the mortar launchers located on the Teigu's shoulders and back, Maya and Tatsumi ducking and weaving to avoid the barrage while Wave flew up to a higher vantage point and called upon Mastema.

" _Run, lend me a hand!_ " he thought, the black wings unleashed a storm of feather projectiles that countered the missiles and destroyed them before they could get close to him and his friends.

Even he could see however even with the three of them combined, they were going to need to do a lot more to even be able to damage the Shikoutazer thanks to its highly resistant metal-infused flesh created from the self-regenerating blood from Solomon.

" _More...I need more…!_ " he thought, Tyrant's presence within the armor becoming more and more prominent as he slowly gave himself to the dragon.

However, like he had asked, he could feel an influx of power course through his veins, but unable to control it he slowly lost control of himself and careened out of the sky towards the ground. He wobbled a little after regaining his balance but continued to hold his head tightly, the pain from Tyrant forcefully trying to take him over causing him to see spots in his vision and make his body go numb. It was the final straw that had broke the camel's back…he could feel himself slowly being consumed by Grand Chariot.

His teeth turned into fangs, he grew even more scales, and he couldn't even stop it from happening.

Unfortunately, he had been so absorbed in what was happening internally to him, he couldn't properly defend himself when the Emperor brought one of his hands up and backhanded him with such force it sent him flying clear out of the Imperial Capital and over the army surrounding the defensive wall.

"Wave!"

"Forget him, he'll be fine! We have more pressing matters to attend to!" yelled Maya to return Tatsumi's attention to the Shikoutazer.

Meanwhile Wave's body had struck the ground several hundred miles away from the Imperial Capital, and he layed there on his hands and knees gripping his head tighter then before and letting out heavy, strained breaths.

" _No...my consciousness is slipping...away into...something else…_ " he thought as he appeared within the psyche of his collapsing mind, which had become a pitch black expanse occupied by the gigantic visage of Tyrant.

The Danger Beast was glaring at him with bared teeth and was ready to snuff out the last part of him that remained in its way of taking his body for itself...Wave's ironclad will.

" _Akame, everyone...forgive me...I let myself be taken over by this...armor…_ "

Almost instantly thoughts of his promise to Akame to remain himself until the revolution had been finished entered his mind, and when he remembered the words he had said...he was filled with overwhelming amounts of determination that began to fuel the almost extinguished fire burning within his soul. As Tyrant's hands closed around him, he began to push back against the dragon's influence and regain control slowly but surely regardless of the transformation he was undergoing.

" _No...I won't back down...I won't give in! I...have to… **FIGHT**!_ "

Tatsumi and Maya were hammering away at the SHikoutazer, but were still unable to make a dent in its durable body because of the self-regenerating flesh it was made of, and they were about to try a different strategy that involved Maya using her Trump Card before all of a sudden a huge explosion of raw power rushed over and through them at break-neck speed, the Emperor even freezing for a moment when he felt it.

They all looked to the direction where Wave had been launched to and noticed a huge smoke cloud covering the entire area, but just from the aura and vile hate emanating from beyond it, Tatsumi and Maya knew immediately just who and what was waiting behind the veil.

The Emperor commenced a scan with the Shikoutazer's long-range analyzers, and when the results came back he was appalled to discover just what had become of the one he had hit earlier on.

" _He's not even registering as human...what kind of goddamn freak is he?!_ " thought the Emperor before the smoke finally cleared, and the entire Imperial Capital was treated to the sight of one of the most feared Danger Beasts coming back to life right before their very eyes.

Wave had transformed once again into the physical manifestation of Tyrant, and with a mighty roar he shook the landscape and sent chills running up and down the spines of everyone and anyone who could hear him. He lowered his head and glared straight at the Shikoutazer, a wave of monstrous and savage killer-intent of the likes which has never been felt before hitting the Emperor and paralyzing him.

"Oh no...it's finally happened...Wave…" murmured Maya, Tatsumi's chest tightening in sorrow for his friend, however after a closer inspection of whom he thought to be Tyrant he discovered that there was a sense of calm emanating from the dragon...not rage and anger.

He couldn't think on it any further when Wave leaped forward and spread out his massive wings, soaring over the land and covering the distance between him and the capital in the blink of an eye while clenching his right fist.

The Emperor brought up both of the Shikoutazer's arms in order to block Wave's punch, but even he couldn't fully withstand the raw power of the human turned Danger Beast and he braced himself against the blow, growling angrily.

" _That filth...he's forced me, in the Supreme Teigu...to take a defensive stance?!_ "

Once Wave flapped his wings and retreated back to the other side of the Imperial Palace grounds, Maya and Tatsumi were floored when he turned his head to gaze at them with a single blue eye and said, " **What are you two waiting for?!** "

"Wave?! You're still alive?!"

" **Of course I am!** " replied Wave with a guttural laugh, Tatsumi grinning at his friend and the optimistic mood he had regardless of his new appearance. " **I'm not letting some damn dragon take me over! Now come on, let's finish this fight once and for all!** "

"Right!" they both replied as Maya activated Imperator's Trump Card and charged the Shikoutazer alongside their friend.

"I have an idea! Just follow my lead!" exclaimed Tatsumi while the Emperor prepared to fire another volley of missiles at them.

Down on the ground a few miles away from where a battle of titans was taking place, Esdeath and Akame were going toe to toe with Jacqueline and Kahfka, who weren't even close to tiring out. The latter had been unable to land a single cut on Kahfka with Murasame, with the same going for the assassin with her ice techniques.

Jacqueline and Esdeath were also unable to land effective blows on one another, the former General's superior mastery of Demon's Extract and her experience with fighting her allowing her to better counter the Great General and put her on the defensive. Jacqueline managed a glance at her puppet and growled when she saw the Shikoutazer begin to get pressured by the combined force of Maya, Tatsumi and Wave in his Danger Beast form.

" _This isn't going to plan!_ " she thought as she parried a swipe from Esdeath's rapier and lunged at her with Basilisk, the General sidestepping the attack and dropping to her knees.

"Grausturm!" she yelled, Jacqueline's eyes widening when the ground split open as several larger pillars of ice sharpened to a point lanced out at her.

Back at the ruins of the Imperial Palace, Wave in his Danger Beast form had proved to be an exceptional asset in combating the Emperor and the SHikoutazer thanks to his increased resilience and ability to spit streams of searing hot flames that could disorientate and distract him long enough for Maya and Tatsumi to move in and attack the Shikoutazer as per their plan.

" _Now matter how tough someone may appear...they always have a weakspot on them somewhere. Being able to find and capitalize on it during battle is the most effective and efficient means of approach…_ " he remembered Susanoo telling him once, the saying the central focus of his plan.

Attacking the Shikoutazer randomly would bring them no results, they had to find the one spot where the titan of a Teigu was weakest and exploit it.

"You freaks! Have a taste of the supreme cannon!" exclaimed the Emperor as he began to charge up the central disk in the Shikoutazer's chest, Wave snarling as he clenched his jaws and clamped his hands and feet down into the ground.

" **We won't give you the chance to fire!** " he roared, his tail coming around at top speed and slamming into the gut of the Shikoutazer, knocking him off balance and giving Maya and Tatsumi plenty of time to fly in side by side with their feet extended out.

They both let out a battle cry as their heels drove deep into the lower abdomen of the Teigu and with an deafening boom they sent the Shikoutazer skidding back across the Imperial Capital grounds from their side all the way to the complete opposite end, its feet leaving two long and dug out scars in the earth. He brought one of its hands down to steady himself and snarled, Wave, Tatsumi and Maya staring at him cautiously and waiting for him to do anything.

Inside the glass bubble the Emperor was on his knees, hands gripping the scepter he received upon being crowned as ruler of the Empire. "I...I am the Emperor! You would dare raise your hand against me...raining down blow after blow upon me like this…?!"

He raised his gaze up and glared at the three of them through the Shikoutazer's eyes, his hatred knowing no bounds. "Even if I took the heads of every last one of your kin, it would still not be enough to atone for this!"

"Emperor?" asked Maya with a smug grin. "You're no Emperor of anything anymore."

"Shut your mouth! Only I can see what is to come! The victor of this battle...what awaits this great Empire...it shall thrive for another millennium!" proclaimed the Emperor with a deranged smile, the chemicals coursing through his vein altering his views of the world so much so that he was hardly his former self any longer.

"Open your fucking eyes!" snarled Tatsumi, his patience with the corrupted ruler completely flying out the window. "Take a look at what's happening around you right now!"

The Emperor continued to stare at him for a few seconds before he pulled up various viewing screens around him in a semi-circle and gasped at the decrepit and horrible state the Imperial Capital was in. Rubble and bodies of both soldiers and ordinary people littered the streets, and those who had survived were beaten, bloody and were either hiding or trying to run away as fast as they could.

"Why...how dare they run away…? Fleeing in the presence of the enemy is punishable by execution."

"They're running because there's nothing left to follow! That's the reality before them! You're not even your own self! Jacqueline is using you to indiscriminately engulf allies and people you were sworn to protect in your onslaught of attacks...she's using you to wipe out the entire city!" said Tatsumi in trying to get through to the real Emperor, but the chemical's effects held strong and he disregarded his words.

"W...W-What insolent cowardice! You treasonous wretches! This is how you repay all I've done for you?! With betrayal?!" he bellowed, Tatsumi clenching his teeth and growling again.

There was no use, whatever Jacqueline had done to him was not going to change any time soon, so there was only one viable option left for him to take. They had to destroy the Shikoutazer to prevent the deaths of any more people, regardless if they're enemy or ally.

"This fight is over. I'll give you one _last_ chance to surrender."

"You...You're out of your mind! It's far from over!" shrieked the Emperor psychotically as he sent the Shikoutazer running towards them, Tatsumi narrowing his eyes and sighting in on the one spot he had been waiting to find.

" _That spot where Maya and I launched our simultaneous attack on earlier...that's where we strike._ " thought Tatsumi before he pointed with Neuntote and informed her and Wave of the situation.

"I got it. Wave and I will distract him, and you go for the killing blow." replied Maya with an affirmative nod as she created her shield and twirled her lance around in his hand once before charging the Emperor head-on.

He reared back with the Shikoutazer's closed fist and Maya countered it with her Guillotine Drop, the two techniques negating one another and giving Wave the chance to snake around her and pounce on the Teigu with his maw wide open. He clawed at the face of the Shikoutazer and actually made five distinct but very shallow cuts in its armor while he bit down hard on its right shoulder near its neck, binding the Teigu and keeping it in place as Tatsumi called upon Tyrant to grant him power.

" _Let's go Tyrant, all I need is the power to smash through that armor once and for all!_ "

" ** _You got it, runt!_** "

A sphere of red energy began to accumulate around his as he absorbed more and more power, and when he registered the threat before him the Emperor growled and reached up to grab Wave's head and rip his teeth out of the Shikoutazer's shoulder before tossing him out in front of him.

"I don't care who or what your are...I shall blast you all out of the skies! You pathetic insects!" snarled the Emperor as disks on the Shikoutazer's kneecaps and shoulders began to charge alongside the central one in its chest, a crash of thunder overhead signalling the arrival of the storm seen earlier before the invasion of the capital had commenced.

Tatsumi, once he had attained enough power, recreated a changed Neuntote that incorporated two extra blades, giving it the appearance of a harpoon, and spread his wings out as wide as they could to fly at the Emperor with the spear pointed straight at its abdomen.

"FALL!" roared the Emperor as he unleashed five concentrated beams of red energy as well as a wave of missiles that dwarfed all of the previous launches combined.

Tatsumi yelled at the top of his lungs while ducking and weaving through the oncoming fire, his sights never leaving the large indention in the Shikoutazer's abdomen, and with a final burst of speed he blew past the Teigu's defenses and rammed Neuntote right on target. The Emperor grunted and cried out in agony as electricity pulsated through his body as Tatsumi drilled past the first layer of armor, his attack beginning to hit the inner machinery of the Shikoutazer that allowed it to operate.

"You scum! What the hell are you?!"

"How many times...do I have to say it…" growled Tatsumi, memories of all of his friends from both Night Raid and the Jaegers who had passed up until now flashing through his mind. "We are Night Raid! We are the Jaegers! We are...the ones...WHO WILL FREE THIS EMPIRE!"

With a final push Tatsumi blew out the back of the Shikoutazer and swept his pear to the side, chunks of armor, synthesized flesh and machinery flying out in all directions as a result of his exit. He glanced back over his shoulder and grinned as electricity began to lance back and forth within the massive hole he had created, the Emperor gasping when he began to system failures all across the board.

"Imposs...ible…" he murmured, Wave taking his chance and approaching the Shikoutazer as it stood rigidly still with fire in his eyes.

He rammed both of his hands into the hole and began to pull with his monstrous strength, heavy groans escaping from the Teigu as the metal began to bend and split apart. It gave away and with a ear-piercing shriek the Shikoutazer was ripped into almost two perfect halves, the tear going right down the middle from in between its legs and all the way up its chest before splitting off to the left and ending at its left shoulder.

Explosions began to rip apart the Teigu even further as Wave let go of the two halves, the Emperor crying and screaming in horror at his defeat and the destruction of the Shikoutazer.

"How dare you?! My Teigu! MY COUNTRY!" he cried with tears streaming down his face before the head of the Teigu struck the wall surrounding the Imperial Palace grounds, the impact knocking him unconscious.

When the other half of the Shikoutazer collapsed onto the city through the torn wall, thankfully not killing anyone else thanks to Wave and Maya evacuating most of the people prior to helping Tatsumi, a deafening victory cry rose up from the unified army surrounding the capital. Solomon fist pumped alongside Leone while Arthur crossed his arms and let out a sigh of relief, his promise now finally fulfilled. Camilla and Chelsea cheered along with the other crew members of the Straelkan airships as they returned to a lower altitude, and at ground zero Tatsumi and Maya high-fived one another while Wave reared his head back, stood up on top of one of the Shikoutazer's fallen halves and let out a mighty roar that proclaimed to the heavens themselves that the great Empire that had flourished for the past thousand years had finally fallen.

When Tatsumi and Maya returned to the ground amidst the ruins of the Imperial Palace, they both felt two familiar presences and turned to see Esdeath and Akame running towards them with smiles on the faces.

"Tatsumi, you did it!" exclaimed Esdeath as she flung her arms around him after Tyrannus had been deactivated, Tatsumi laughing as he ran a hand through her hair. "I knew you could do it."

"Was there really any doubt?" he asked cockily, Esdeath eyeing him and grinning at him before she looked up at Wave when he sat back on the haunches of his legs.

"How you doing there Wave?" she yelled up at him, the Jaeger turned dragon giving her a toothy smile.

" **It's definitely different...being a dragon and all…** " he replied before he noticed Akame standing next to her, his heart clenching when he saw the look on her face.

He lowered his head down to her level and stared at her with one of his eyes, which was just about the size of her, and sighed heavily, " **Akame...I'm sorry…** "

"I don't care." she said, cutting him off and hugging a portion of his snout. "I'm just glad you're alive."

"Guys, that was fucking awesome! You actually beat that thing!" exclaimed Solomon when he appeared alongside Chelsea, Camilla, Leone and Arthur from over the wall and sprinted towards them. "And holy _shit_ Wave, you turned huge!"

" **Don't remind me…** "

They all shared a laugh at his remark, but their good times were cut off shortly when they heard footsteps in the distance and turned towards their source. Their happy expressions dropped as they watched Jacqueline stride towards them, a heavy scowl on her face, alongside Kahfka.

"You...you ruined everything!" she snarled, Tatsumi stepping forward and glaring at her while Wave bared his teeth and emanated a growl from his throat.

"It's over, Jacqueline. Honest is already dead, so you got your revenge. It's time to stop fighting." he said to try and reason with her, but she would have none of it and brought up Basilisk.

"No, it most certainly is _not_ over. I won't stop until I've killed everyone in this city...and I'm going to start with all of _you_. Kahfka!"

She dropped to her knees and with a smirk she used Demon's Extract to create a huge wall of ice that dwarfed the ruined wall around the palace, and it didn't stop growing into it curved in the air and formed a dome that covered the entire area, trapping them all inside of it.

"I had a feeling that you would be our last opponent…" said Esdeath with a chuckle as she drew her rapier and stood shoulder to shoulder with Tatsumi, his armor returning in a pillar of fire as she did.

Suddenly Akame stepped up beside them both and drew Murasame from its sheath, Tatsumi only glancing at her once to confirm that she wasn't going anywhere, so instead of trying to argue with her he addressed everyone else with authoritative tone and told them to stand back. From his tone alone they knew he was being dead serious, and they followed his orders by retreating with Wave to where the head of the Shikoutazer was located to observe the battle from afar and be at the ready line in case they needed to jump in to help.

Once they were out of the way, Tatsumi returned his focus to Jacqueline and lowered his head ever-so-slightly, the Great General glaring at him with unrivaled fury.

"For the sake of protecting the people, for peace of the new world, and a future for the next generation, we will stop you here and now."

"I have no need for your tedious speech." growled Jacqueline while she twirled Basilisk around and got into a battle stance. "If you want to stop me...then you'll have to kill me."


	46. Until Death do us Part

A/N OHHHHH SHIT IS GOING DOWN FOR REAL, even more so then before. Did you all like my version of the fight against the Shikoutazer? Personally, I think it trumps both the Anime's version and the Manga's, especially since I had Wave turn into a MOTHER FUCKING DRAGON. But seriously guys, this is it. There's no point in keeping it from you all. This shall be the final fight...for now that is. Tatsumi, Esdeath and Akame versus Jacqueline and Kahfka, the ultimate battle royale. Leave a fav and review, and let the fight begin!

* * *

 **Chapter 45 - Until Death do us Part**

The two opposing sides stared intensely at one another, each waiting for their opposites to make the first move. Suddenly Esdeath's hand dropped and she sprung forward alongside Akame while Tatsumi returned Neuntote to its previous appearance and turned invisible, Jacqueline grinning maliciously as she ran to meet Esdeath head on and leave Kahfka to do her own thing.

"I'll slaughter you!" said Kahfka while swinging her up arm to create a large ice pillar that carried her high up into the sky, Akame crouching down sprinting up the face of the still growing structure.

Down on the ground Jacqueline commenced her duel with Esdeath, their blades clanging loudly when they struck one another, and when it seemed like she was entirely focused on her she proved them wrong by creating a bone shaft and blocking Neuntote when tatsumi appeared right behind her.

She dropped to her knees and spun around on her hands with her legs extended, Tatsumi and Esdeath leaping back to avoid having their feet kicked out from under them.

"You two have certainly grown more powerful, but so have I!" she proclaimed as she tapped into her vast reserves of power she had gained from sucking Solomon's blood with Absordex for the past three days.

Meanwhile Akame and Kahfka had drawn their fight away from them and were entirely focused on another, their blades hitting one another with killing force and vigor. Akame aimed at her throat with Murasame and she ducked back, making a counterattacked soon after by kicking her in the gut and sending her skidding back a few yards.

"Kalt Grausamkeit!"

Akame saw the ice spear shoot towards her, with one fluid motion she flipped her grip on her sword and with a backhanded swing she cut into the very tip of the spear and cleaved it in two perfect halves as it passed by her arm. She withdrew Murasame from the spear and charged Kahfka, who removed her arm from the ice and bringing around her ice sword to meet the poisoned blade.

"Why are you helping her? She's going to kill innocent people!"

"Innocent?!" scoffed Kahfka before she grasped the ice sword with both hands and pushed Akame back. "There's no such thing as innocence here! Both of our families were killed by the Empire's dogs, and its only right we pay them back!"

Kahfka went on the offensive and pressured Akame, her skill with the blade on par with the assassin's since they had both once been members of the Elite Seven. She very nearly beheaded her after finding an opening in her defense, but thanks to a timely dodge she only had a small lock of her hair get severed. However, now that she was on her heels Kahfka smiled evilly as she reached out with her free hand to try and touch and freeze her with Demon's Extract.

Akame reacted quickly by cutting off her arm guard and when Kahfka froze the piece of lightweight armor, she cut it in two with Murasame and launched herself into the sky. She gasped at the sudden disappearance of her enemy, and before she could react Akame came right back down behind her with her sword and seemingly cut into her back with one clean cut.

She brought her gaze up and growled at the sight of an ice shield hovering inches away from Kahfka's back, the former assassin giggling after the failed attack and turning to look at her when she leaped back.

"As expected of you, the infamous Akame of Demon Sword Murasame. Tell me, how many people have you killed with that sword?" she asked, Akame biting her lip and giving her a stoic look.

"Too many to count. I bear all of them on my shoulders...I can never forget them. The Demon Sword never forgets them."

"Then you're no different then Jacqueline and I. The same can be said for Esdeath. We've all killed an innumerable amount of people...we're all tainted." stated Kahfka while she created another ice sword to compliment the one she already had in her right hand. "And you know what else?"

"What?" asked Akame, Kahfka pointing at her and cocking her head slightly to the right.

"Would you do anything different? How would _you_ react if you watched your parents burn right in front of you, or like me, watched your entire family be shot dead? What would you do?"

Akame opened her mouth to respond, but immediately closed it when she found that she couldn't She had no answer to give Kahfka, and with her silence came a laugh from her as she crouched down slightly and snorted. "Just like I thought, you have no answer. In fact, I bet you would probably want to do the same thing…"

"You're wrong!"

Akame ran straight at Kahfka and restarted their sword fight, Murasame striking her ice swords with even more strength then before as she argued with Kahfka over the morally right and wrong way to avenge the death of a family member. "There is nothing right with killing millions of people because of the actions of one man! There are those who still retain the right to live!"

She was kicked away, and she leaped up into the air in order to slash down onto Kahfka with a downward swipe, and when she stopped her sword by holding both of hers up in an X fashion, she pressed forward with her statement.

"You both are wrong!"

"I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about! Even now you desire to kill Jacqueline for killing your sister!" replied back Kahfka before she dropped to her knees and summoned a massive mountain of ice once again with her Trump Card, Akame grunting as she held on for dear life.

She finally let go after she was carried high up into the air, and with a smirk Kahfka pressed her hand against the mountain in order to generate more ice spears to try and impale her, but she never got the chance when an overwhelming amount of killer intent appeared behind her. She whirled around to meet the new enemy, but Tatsumi already had gotten in close and with a vicious punch to the jaw he sent Kahfka barreling through the mountain and flying out the other side for several hundred meters.

With her out of the way, he caught Akame before she hit the ground and told her to held Esdeath fight Jacqueline while he would take care of Kahfka.

"Good luck." she said before sprinting towards his wife, Tatsumi closing his eyes and refocusing before turning to stare down Kahfka with spear in hand.

She recovered from his attack and wiped some blood away from her lip, her grin returning like nothing had happened. "Oh, so now I get to play with you?"

Tatsumi only narrowed his eyes a fraction of an inch before he turned into a blur, Kahfka gasping and reacting purely on instinct in order to deflect Neuntote away from herself when he reappeared only a few feet in front of her. Using both her ice swords and a multitude of her techniques she traded blow for blow with Tatsumi, the rubble and ruined earth around them quickly becoming broken and shattered fragments of ice as he blew his way through each of her defenses with his enhanced strength.

"This the end! Just give up!" yelled Kahfka with a snarl as she caught Tatsumi's fist and twisted his arm, flipping him over onto his back so she could land a devastating punch into his ribcage.

"As if!" he replied with a grunt, Kahfka gasping when he grabbed her arm tightly and used her own weight after he threw her forward to pick himself up and whirl around with Neuntote's blade flashing brightly like a bolt of lightning.

Jacqueline's eyes widened when she heard Kahfka scream and she looked back just in time to see her severed right arm fly off the to the side and Tatsumi twirl around once more in order to split open her abdomen and very nearly cleave her in two. Something inside of her snapped and without a second thought she broke away from Esdeath and Akame to go after her lover's attacker.

"Get away from her!" she shouted angrily, Tatsumi looking back with wide eyes as she created multiple bone shards from her forearm and flung them at him.

As he simultaneously deflected them while hopping back a few feet, Jacqueline rushed him and dropped Basilisk in order to lunge at him with only her bare hands. She ducked under a punch and she rammed her knuckles into his gut, knocking the wind out of him and putting him back on his heels so that she could follow up by sending her elbow straight into the side of his head.

She came onto him so suddenly he didn't have time to set up a proper defense, so he was at her mercy as she tore into him. She punched him in the jaw again and he let go of Neuntote, allowing her to grab the spear and with a battle cry she plowed the spear down into his shoulder through Tyrannus. Jacqueline then kicked him in the chest and sent him flying back, a quick recovery with his wings helping him stop next to Esdeath while Akame ran past him with her eyes set on the Great General's jugular.

"Akame, wait!" shouted Esdeath, but she pressed on and attacked Jacqueline, the Great General scowling at her as she withdrew a bone sword from her shoulder to fight her.

"Akame…? That's your name correct?" asked Jacqueline, Akame narrowing her eyes as their blades bounced off one another.

"What about it?"

"I remember, that girl...Kurome. She was your sister, wasn't she?"

Akame's heart tightened up and she snarled at the mentioning of her sister, Jacqueline grunting when the assassin increased the force she put behind her sword swings. She had definitely struck a nerve, but what was happening to her had in fact just proven the point Kahfka had made earlier that Jacqueline also truly believed in.

"You said we're wrong for trying to destroy the Empire, but you attacking me like this after I killed your sister...it's the exact same thing!" she proclaimed when all of a sudden she turned the tables on Akame by turning to the side and allowing Murasame to pierce through her bicep, allowing her to grab onto it and punch her in the face to force her to let go.

When she did Jacqueline removed Murasame from her arm, twirled around and kicked Akame hard in the ribcage to send her back to Esdeath and Tatsumi, who caught her mid-flight and set her feet back on the ground.

"I'm fine...she has Murasame's poison in her system...this fight is over." murmured Akame with a heavy breath, the trio looking up at the Great General and waiting in silence for the demon blade to kill its latest victim.

To their horror and shock, however, Jacqueline took the bone sword in her other hand after stabbing Murasame into the dirt she hacked off her own arm just above where she had been stabbed by Murasame, eliminating the chance of the her being killed by the poison. Then she started to laugh as her arm instantly regrew itself good as new, the bone sword now useless to her, so she tossed it aside and grasped Murasame once again with her dominate hand.

"Finally...at long last…" murmured Jacqueline while she turned to face the three of them, the rest of the survivors of the capital invasion watching from afar next to the fallen husk of the Shikoutazer with dumbfounded expressions.

"At long last? What are you talking about?" asked Tatsumi, Jacqueline beginning to giggle like a schoolgirl after the demonic aura returned to the sword.

"I'm going to ask you all a question...do you know why Murasame is called the Demon Blade?" she asked of the trio, Tatsumi glancing from Esdeath to Akame and back to Jacqueline as the Great General ran the length of her finger along the dull edge of Murasame gingerly like it was her own child.

She waited for an answer to be said, but when not a single one came she looked back down at the blade and giggled again, her finger stopped at the very tip of the sword. "The reason is because when Murasame was crafted, it was made alongside another Teigu...one that gained a reputation for also being demonic. They were intended to be a pair used by a single user."

"A pair? Are your referring to Yatsufusa?" asked Esdeath, which seemed to be the logical answer.

Yatsufusa could turn the corpses of deceased people into living puppets incapable of feeling pain, and Murasame was drenched in a poison so potent that even the tiniest of scratches can mean certain death. Those two being wielded by a single user would definitely prove to be a difficult challenge for anyone, however, instead of confirming her guess, Jacqueline merely shook her head in disdain and placed her free hand on her hip.

"Yatsufusa? Hardly. The Teigu that I'm referring to, the partner to Murasame...is the second heart that's beating inside of me at this very moment." she revealed with a grin, Akame's eyes shooting wide open in disbelief while Tatsumi and Esdeath were left utterly speechless. "Yes...One-Cut Killer: Murasame and Demonic Savagery: Devil's Heart were created alongside one another with the purpose of being used simultaneously by a single user. And another thing...I know that with either Teigu, one could not use their Trump Card. To be able to use it, one must be in possession of _both_ Teigu."

Tatsumi clenched his fists tightly when he sensed a change inside Jacqueline, not a subtle or underhanded one, but a change that could spell disaster and chaos for them. She was planning on doing something drastic soon, and he had a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach that it was probably going to coincide with the mentioning of the shared Trump Card between Murasame and Devil's Heart.

He glanced over at Esdeath and felt a little less uncomfortable when he saw that she had tightened her grip around her rapier in anticipation for the continuation of their brawl they both knew was coming.

"And since you have so graciously delivered me Murasame, Akame...I can finally utilize its Trump Card." finished Jacqueline as she gripped the sword's handle with both hands and smiled evilly.

They watched in silence as Jacqueline raised Murasame up high into the air, the evening sun's rays striking the sword's tempered steel and creating a slight twinkle. The only sound heard was the soft whistling of the wind and the steady beat of her heart alongside Devil's Heart. Jacqueline's smile widened as she stopped her hands above her head and glared at her enemies for a fraction of a second, the Trump Card's title flashing through her mind.

" _Immortal Blood Seal Release._ "

Suddenly she flipped Murasame around in her hands and plunged the blade through her chest, blood gushing out of the wound and down her back. Tatsumi, Esdeath and Akame were left horrified as she staggered forward and coughed vigorously, the demon sword's poison beginning to spread through her system like wildfire.

She pulled Murasame back out of her chest with a grunt and stabbed its tip into the dirt, her weight falling on it when she lost all feeling in her legs. Everyone watching thought she was absolutely crazy, stabbing herself with the blade, but she merely smiled at them before collapsing onto her knees and hunching over. The convulsions came next and her arms wrapped tightly around her gut, wave upon wave of agonizing pain starting to course through her as if she was being stabbed by searing hot pikes.

"What's happening to her…?" asked Tatsumi under his breath, Esdeath shrugging.

"I don't know...be careful." she replied back.

By then Jacqueline had started to cough and hack out blood as the poison began to take its tole on her body, but miraculously she still hadn't died from it yet. When it seemed like it wouldn't get any worse then it already was, Jacqueline's entire body just froze up and stopped moving entirely.

Nothing made a sound. It was as if the world itself had stopped rotating, space and time coming to a grinding halt.

From Tatsumi and Esdeath's point of view, it seemed that Jacqueline had merely stopped for a moment of rest before the inevitable. What they didn't realize was that the inevitable had already arrived. The incurable poison of Murasame had finally accomplished its grim deed...her heart had stopped beating.

She was dead. Yet, curiously...Devil's Heart continued to beat within her. _Ba-dump_. _Ba-dump_. _Ba-dump_.

"Is she...dead?" asked Maya in almost a whisper, she and the other members of standing by the Shikoutazer's head watching closely for any sign of movement from the Great General. "What can you make out Wave?"

" _Nothing's happening yet...but it appears that Jacqueline has died…_ " said their dragon friend, but he narrowed his eyes and even began to doubt his own statement since he could feel Jacqueline's presence pulsating like the beat of a heart.

Another few seconds of dead silence washed over the barren wasteland that used to be the Imperial Palace grounds. It was so silent that if a pin was dropped it would sound like thunder.

Suddenly Jacqueline's entire body jerked as her heart was suddenly jumpstarted and a huge amount of raw energy exploded to life around her, with all of the wind in the immediate area shooting backward as a result of the resounding shockwave. Tatsumi held an arm up and had to squint his eyes just to be able to see clearly through the whirlwinds and dust getting blown around but the sudden awakening.

By now the ring of dark purplish-red energy seeping out of Jacqueline's body had grown in power, and she was showing signs of life again when she managed to pull herself up and sit on her knees with her legs folded up underneath. Her hair was whipping around behind her from the wind and she was laughing, her arms crossing over her stomach as if it was hurting her to laugh.

" _ **Destroy everything. Kill everyone. Splatter their blood across the ground and stain the world red!**_ "

As the voice she hadn't heard in so long began to talk to her once again, the color of her hair began to change. Starting at the top of her head from its roots and working down its auburn color faded away into a bleached white, as if she had lost all of her life and was turning old in the blink of an eye. This was half-right. Her hair was turning white because, as a result of accepting the poison of Murasame, she had well and truly died, but it was Devil's Heart that brought her back from death's cold grasp.

The dark energy finally dispersed like a cloud of smoke and the ferocious winds died down, Tatsumi and Esdeath watching as Jacqueline pushed herself up to her feet and grasped the hilt of Murasame with her left hand. The final piece of her transformation happened when swirling flame-like tattoos and markings appeared on her skin across her whole body, one marking specifically that popped up in the center of her chest just above her cleavage taking on the appearance of a heart.

Jacqueline's smile widened as she slowly parted her eyelids and glared at her enemies, revealing to them that her eyes had also morphed from their usual yellow and purple color to blood red with pure white slit pupils.

"So...this is the Trump Card of Murasame and Devil's Heart?" asked Esdeath warily, the Great General giggling enthusiastically as she brought up the demon sword and pointed its tip at her.

Even the sword had gained a more demonic appearance, with the hilt of the sword gaining the motif of a snake on it and the usually silver blade turning pitch black with a tinge of red in it.

"Indeed. The Immortal Blood Seal, where the user embraces their inner demon and loses all of their humanity in order to gain immense power. Meaning…" she started before the same dark purple aura from before began to emerge from the sword itself, Murasame seemingly coming to life in her grasp. "I am no longer human, and I cannot be killed. So let's get this on with, shall we?"

Esdeath clenched her jaw muscles and tensed up with Tatsumi, the Jaeger turning back at Akame and quickly saying, "Akame, get back to the others. Hurry."

"But I can help!"

Slowly he turned his head and glared at her with a gaze that told her not to argue with him. "You'll only get in the way."

Akame bit her lip and lowered her gaze before she took off running, Tatsumi returning his stare to Jacqueline when the Great General gripped Murasame with both hands and entered a battle stance. Esdeath created her ice wings and growled a little, Tatsumi hunching over and spreading his feet apart with fire in his eyes as they prepared to go at one another at full strength, but when he moved his wounded arm he winced and grunted ever-so-slightly.

"Are you okay?" asked Esdeath out of concern for her husband.

"Yeah, it's just a minor injury" he replied, but she could tell that from his tone of voice he was nearing exhaustion due to having just fought the most powerful Teigu ever made.

With that in mind she lowered her rapier and placed a hand on his shoulder, Tatsumi glancing at her with a confused look in his eyes as she smiled softly. "Rest, you've expended a lot of energy fighting the Shikoutazer. I'm still good to go, so I'll fight Jacqueline."

"No, I can still fight."

"Yes, I know, but it's time I payed you back for that fight against Budo." stated Esdeath, Tatsumi thinking back to that day when he had told her to take a break while he had fought the late Great General.

"That may be true...but we're sticking together on this one." replied Tatsumi with a grin before he disregarded the pain in his shoulder and switched Neuntote over to his other hand.

Esdeath rolled her eyes at his stubbornness and let the matter go in order to focus on fighting Jacqueline in her heightened state. A few moments of dead silence passed by between the three of them before she and Tatsumi ran at her and leaped to cover the distance quickly, Jacqueline grinning while she lowered Murasame and closed her eyes.

Tatsumi threw a fist at her jaw and in a split second she stopped it inches away from her cheek with a single hand, surprising him with her monstrous strength now that she had used the Trump Card Murasame and Devil's Heart shared. Suddenly she cut once across his chest, getting dangerously close to his skin after easily slashing through Tyrannus, and threw her own punch that broke off half of his helmet with ease and threw him to the side.

Esdeath then joined the fray and Jacqueline, like with Tatsumi, easily made short work of her by avoiding all of rapier lunges and stabs, then grabbed the sword itself and literally broke it in two with Murasame. Then with a devastating kick to the knee she broke Esdeath's right leg and then tossed her to the side, grinning a little at the cry of anguish and turning her head when Tatsumi, enraged over the injuring of his wife, assaulted her with a flurry of punches, kicks and swipes with Neuntote that she proceeded to deflect and return with ones of her own that continued to chip away at Tyrannus.

"Sorry, but this is the end of the line." said Jacqueline with a small smile as she sent Tatsumi flying back several yards with another kick at his abdomen and dropped her free hand.

The skin at her palm split and opened to allow a bone shaft to slide out of her forearm, only instead of the normal pasty white color it was pitch black. The reason for this was upon taking in the poison of Murasame, Devil's Heart had circulated it throughout her whole system and actually injected it into her very skeleton, turning it black and infusing it with the poison so that regardless if she used the sword or her bones, a single cut would prove fatal.

Jacqueline reared her arm back after extending the length of the shaft into a spear and prepared to throw it at Tatsumi, the Jaeger bringing up Neuntote in order to defend himself. That's when the Great General, out of the corner of her eye, noticed Esdeath laying on the ground with the leg she had broken earlier tucked up close to her. She could tell that it would difficult for her to move, and that if she did try there would be too much pain for her to bear, so with that in mind...she smiled evilly and let out a deep breath to steady herself.

As quick as lightning she shifted ever-so-slightly to the right and threw the bone spear straight at Esdeath, Tatsumi's eyes widening in shock and fear for her life when he realized what was happening. He quickly manifested the Dragon Scale Layered Defense to try and stop the projectile, but the shield was powerless to stop the rod from smashing through each wall he had made and growing ever closer to his wife.

That's when everything went into slow motion. The spear smashing through the final wall, Tatsumi unconsciously breaking into a dead sprint, and Esdeath bringing up an arm to create an ice barrier to protect herself even thought she knew that if it could penetrate through the Dragon Scaled Layered Defense...it would surely pierce through her ice.

Esdeath waited for the end to come, for the black to take over, but...it never came. Instead, what struck her was the sound of flesh getting pierced, and she slowly lowered her arm and opened her eyes to bear witness to something horrifying. Jacqueline, after surveying the damage she had caused, crossed her arms and watched with a grin as the next turn of events played out before her.

"T-Tatsumi…?" stuttered Esdeath, her husband bringing his gaze up from his stomach to look her in the eyes with a weak smile when Tyrannus dissipated around him just as the rain clouds began to let loose their wet payload.

"I'm...not letting you die...I swore on it..." he said with a wince, Esdeath's eyes dropping to the bloody tip of the bone spear protruding out from his gut with his hands wrapped tightly around it.

To save her life...he had willingly stepped into the path of the spear and stopped it by using his body as a shield that had taken the full-force of the projectile. It had stabbed him through his lower back and emerged out of his abdomen after piercing through Tyrannus, with the last line of defense that brought the bone spear to a halt being his strong-as-steel grip.

He grunted and coughed when Murasame's poison began to infect his bloodstream, his legs becoming weaker and weaker until they finally gave out and he fell forward. Before he could hit the ground, however, Esdeath caught him and quickly pulled out the spear from his gut, Tatsumi letting out a sharp breath of air in response. His body collapsed onto her shoulder and she could feel her arms start to get warm and moist from the blood gushing out of his wound.

"Why did you do that?! Why did you step in front of me?" she demanded as her heartbeat increased by two, Tatsumi coughing up some blood and lightly chuckling afterwards.

"Hehe...I-I'm sorry...my body just moved on its own…" he said while he started to lose feeling in his hands and arms. "I didn't want...t-to see you get hurt again…"

He coughed and his entire body writhed in agony as a result of Murasame's poison, but thanks to his strong will the rate at which it spread though his system had slowed to a crawl, allowing him a few extra minutes of time to spend with Esdeath.

"There has to be a way to save you, I don't want you to die! You can't die, Lucena is waiting for us! She needs her father! _I_ need you, Tatsumi!" pleaded Esdeath while she tried desperately with her free hand to stop the flow of blood coming out of his wound, with Tatsumi only watching with a weak smile.

"Esdeath...stop…" he urged with a grunt as he pushed himself off her shoulder in order to look her straight in the eyes. "T-There's nothing...else you can do…"

"No, don't say that. Don't fucking say that!" cried Esdeath when tears began to appear in the corners of her eyes, the sight of her beloved and the glazed over look in his appearance absolutely tearing her apart inside.

From where they stood close by to the head of the fallen Shikoutazer, everyone except Wave sheltering themselves underneath the crest of its crown, Akame, Maya and the rest watched in utter silence at what was happening before their very eyes. Camilla couldn't bear to watch any further and she turned away, Solomon wrapping an arm around her and hugging her, and right next to them were Leone and Chelsea, the two standing shoulder to shoulder with faces blank but their hearts wrapped in chains.

"Esdeath…" murmured Tatsumi, his wife watching with teary eyes as he painfully raised up his right hand in order to cup her cheek.

His touch felt extremely cold, a sign that he was nearing the end of his time, so to try and preserve what little remaining of it she brought up brought both of her own in order to grasp his tightly

"Y-You know...thinking back to the day that I...I was supposed to be executed…" he started to say before coughing up some more blood, the hacking and wheezing sound emerging from his lips cracking away at Esdeath's already torn up heart. "And even to when...you threw me into that damn wall that night...I've finally realized that I agree with you."

"About what…?" she asked, Tatsumi smiling weakly.

"I wouldn't want to change anything that's happened up until now for the world and more. I'm glad that I fell in love with you...that we got married...that we…" he said, a vicious cough overtaking him mid-sentence before he used his sleeve to wipe his lips clean. "T-That we had a child, a beautiful daughter. I would give everything up to do that...all again…"

Esdeath's lower lip quivered and the tears in the corners of her eyes began to drip down her cheeks, the markings of Murasame's poison appearing from underneath Tatsumi's clothing and creeping up his neck.

"I never would've been able...to experience so many wonderful things without you. To...to walk a different path, one that I never would've seen myself travelling down." he rambled on, his breaths getting weaker and weaker the more Murasame's poison took control and spread its vileness throughout his body. "And out of all of what has happened to me since leaving my home town...the best parts are when I was with you. They are some of my...most treasured memories..."

"Tatsumi, please…don't do this to me..." weeped Esdeath, the hands holding his starting to shake. "I can't live without you…you're...y-you're..."

"Esdeath…" murmured Tatsumi in almost a whisper before, with his last ounce of strength, he leaned up kissed her on the lips for the last time.

Now it was his turn to cry as he poured all of his love and passion for her into that final kiss, Esdeath bringing her other arm around him and holding him up as if she was trying to keep him tethered to this world for just a little while longer.

Unfortunately...fate wasn't on her side. His thread had already been cut. There was no stopping it now...the end had arrived.

When their lips separated Tatsumi smiled and looked directly into Esdeath's eyes, making sure she saw and heard every single last word he was about to say.

"Esdeath...I...love you…don't you _ever_ forget that." he spoke with one last breath, the hand within Esdeath's growing limp and his eyes closing shut as Murasame's poison finished its gruesome deed.

His body slowly tipped over to the left and Esdeath could just barely react in time in order to catch him before he hit the dirt, her heart skipping a beat. She held his head in her lap after painfully bringing her broken leg up underneath her and squeezed his hand to try and wake him up, like he had only fainted from exhaustion and that he was going to stand back up here in a few moments, good as new.

"No, please, you can't do this to me. T-Tatsumi, come on… _please_...don't leave me alone..." she cried, but it was futile to keep on trying.

That's when reality itself came crashing down on her like an avalanche, her heart and her soul shattering into millions upon millions of pieces when Tatsumi's passing became all too real. She didn't want to believe it, but the longer she stared down at the tranquil expression on his face, the quicker that thought faded away.

Grief. Sadness. Sorrow. Despair. All of these foreign emotions and more began to well up inside Esdeath to the point her broken heart couldn't contain it anymore and, like a volcano, it exploded out from within all at once. She sobbed like she had never sobbed before, her tears a relentless downpour that could not be stopped through any means whatsoever.

To those watching, it was an unimaginable sight. The feared Ice Queen, the Empire's Strongest General, who was proud of her strength, determined, and most of all happy when among friends and her husband...was crying and showing off a personality never before seen from her. Her wails of sorrow echoed off the broken wall of what used to protect the Imperial Palace grounds, and with every single one she let out it caused those standing by the Shikoutazer to feel nothing but gloom and grief for her.

Wave closed his eyes and bowed his head out of respect for his friend, Maya had turned and looked away to hide her own tears which had started to fall, and Akame had allowed her hair to cover a majority of her face to conceal her emotions. Leone had mixed feelings of rage and sorrow swirling around inside her, visions of Mine's death only making it that much harder for her to keep herself in check and to not break down crying, Chelsea had cupped her hands over her mouth and had clenched her eyes shut like it was all some bad dream, and Solomon was shielding Camilla with his body as he too struggled with himself and his emotions while she cried.

Esdeath continued to cry until she had no more tears left, which led her to just sit on her knees with Tatsumi's head still resting in her arms and let the rain wet her hair and clothes. Her eyes were as big as the moon, all red and puffy and filled with despair, as she stared at her husband with such intensity one would think they were literally glued on him.

The fact of the matter was that when Tatsumi had died, a part of her had died as well...and the aftershocks were still tearing her up inside to the point she couldn't think any more.

"So he did end up dying..." said Jacqueline as her grin vanished, Esdeath freezing up when he heard her voice. "That is certainly unfortunate..."

"That bitch…" snarled Solomon under his breath as he watched her slowly walk towards Esdeath, another bone shaft extending itself out of her palm.

"But, all good things must come to an end. Are you ready to die? At least you'll be able to join him." asked Jacqueline after she reached Esdeath and stood just a couple of feet behind her.

She said nothing as as she brought her arm back, the bone shaft's razor-sharp tip poised to go through the back of her neck and through her throat. She didn't care anymore, the one person she loved most over everything had just been snatched away from her by a cruel twist of fate, and as a result, all of the life and joy inside of her had vanished entirely. All she could do was stare down at Tatsumi and continue to hold onto his hand even though he was already far gone.

When she felt like there was no hope left in the world, and that it was pointless to continue on, she felt a dark, hateful presence emerge in the back of her mind. Instantly she found herself sitting in a darkened room devoid of any features except for a tiled floor flooded with water, and a massive pair of heavy iron gates spanning the room from one wall of darkness to the other.

There was a huge lock keeping them shut, and staring at her from behind the bars was a pair of brightly glowing red eyes many times bigger then her.

" **You know what to do...Esdeath…** "

Esdeath didn't reply to the creature, so to get her attention the unknown beast smashes its ice covered claws up against the iron bars to scare her into looking up into its eyes. " **You would so easily give up!? After everything that you've done? Pitiful!** "

The create scraped its claws against the surface of the lock, creating deep gashes in the treated metal, before returning its hand to the shadows of the dark expanse beyond the bars while its eyes remained perfectly visible.

"But...he...Tatsumi…" stuttered Esdeath through her tears, the creature snarling again at her inability to understand its point.

" **You pathetic little worm! You're Esdeath, the strongest General ever produced by the Empire, and you're letting one of your own former subordinates outdo you like this?! You were the first and only person to subjugate me and put my consciousness behind these bars, and after what just occurred…** " said the beast as it lifted up one of its claws and slammed it into the bars again, Esdeath's eyes widening when she saw several large cracks appear in them. " **Your iron will has weakened to the point I could easily break free and turn you into another broken-minded sack of flesh just like those who had previously tried to control my power.** "

Esdeath lowered her gaze again and the beast decided enough was enough, so to show her how much it meant business it grasped the bars of the cage with both hands and with a deafening roar, it ripped them apart and clambered out into the dimly lit chamber in order to stare at her directly with one of its large eyes. The creature standing overtop of her was none other then the Super-class Danger Beast her Teigu, Demon's Extract, had been forged from. It's body was covered heavily with a thick coat of white fur laced with ice, its head almost dominated entirely by horn-like appendages that gave it a demonic appearance, and swishing from its backside left to right were a pair of tails tipped with razor sharp icicles that could easily bash anything into submission.

It's name, forever told in history as the Scourge of the North, was Alzora, a Danger Beast so powerful and dangerous that it could even give Tyrant a run for its money.

" **Do you see now just what kind of predicament you are in?** " questioned Alzora while staring at Esdeath with one of its massive eyes, the former General only just as big as its slit pupil.

" **If you are to have any chance of defeating your former subordinate, you must do away with these restraints and unlock the true power stored inside of you, just like that other girl.** "

"But...I…"

" **What would your husband do in a situation like this? Would he so readily give up when it seemed like there was no hope left, or would he continue to fight?** " asked Alzora again, Esdeath closing her eyes and whimpering slightly at the mentioning of Tatsumi. " **ANSWER ME!** "

"No! H-He...he wouldn't give up…" she said in almost a whisper, the Danger Beast closing its eyes as its body suddenly began to morph and change, revealing one of its uncanny abilities to switch from its normal beast form to a human one it could use to hide itself more easily.

Alzora let out a relaxed breath upon completing the transformation, the Danger Beast now having the physique of a matured woman with two pairs of ice horns protruding out of the side of her head, fair skin, some blue marks situated on certain parts, a unique dress with various silver pendants hanging from the waistline that revealed her cleavage, and piercing scarlet eyes with slit pupils. Her long flowing white hair with tinges of blue streaked across it here and there reached down to her waist and flapped a little behind her as she walked up to Esdeath and kneeled down before her.

She gently raised up Esdeath's head by her chin and looked her in the eye, the tattoo on her chest beginning to let off a bright blue glow upon making contact with the demonic Danger Beast.

"I'm sorry for using such a tone, but I needed to get your attention, Esdeath. Please, use my power. I've grown to like you, Esdeath, and I want to continue to see what becomes of your life since I spent mine for so long trapped inside that urn." she said softly, her calm and almost motherly demeanor a sharp contrast from her previous one as a terrifying creature of the north. "Avenge your husband. Make that Great General know why they called you the Empire's Strongest General."

Suddenly Alzora touched her hand to the tattoo on Esdeath's chest and she felt an enormous amount of anger, hate, rage and overwhelming power enter her system all at once. Instead of letting it consume her however, she twisted and bended it to her own will just as she had done so when first acquiring Demon's Extract and smiled.

Outside in the real world, Jacqueline was about to finish off her sworn enemy with one swift blow, but before she could she was blown away by a sudden release of energy from within Esdeath that manifested in a dark blue dome around her. A pillar of the same dark aura shot up into the sky and pushed aside any clouds in the immediate vicinity from the shockwave it produced, Jacqueline and everyone else in attendance watching in shock as Esdeath woke up from the sorrow-induced trance Tatsumi's death had put her in.

Even though her tears continued to fall down her face, she clenched her teeth and disregarded the pain from her broken leg in order to stand up, back facing Jacqueline. Her long hair was whipping in a frenzy all around her as Demon's Extract started to transform her in a similar fashion to what Kahfka had gone through on a much smaller scale.

Two horns of ice emerged from the sides of her head through her hair and blue markings appeared all across her skin, a pair of streaks appearing on each of her cheeks to give her a more feral appearance while her eyes changed into that of a demon's, with slit pupils and grey sclerae. Ice continued to manifest around her as she released more and more stored up energy, her fingers getting covered with ice that straightened out and curved into claws meant for ripping apart flesh.

That's when she noticed a faint red glow coming from beneath her vision and she looked down, gasping when she discovered what its origin was. She smiled and reached down, Jacqueline unsure of what she was doing until the dome of energy dissipated and Esdeath's hair returned to normal, signalling the end of her transformation from a human to an icy demon.

She slowly turned her head around until she was glaring at Jacqueline with a single rage-filled eye, and almost instantly the Great General shivered at the massive bloodlust Esdeath was giving off just from a mere glance.

"I'm going to kill you…" she snarled in a low tone before fully turning around, revealing to everyone that within her grasp was none other then the original key for Tyrannus.

" **Don't tell me she's actually going to do it.** " murmured Wave in awe as he watched with Akame and Leone their friend twirl the sword around and aim its tip towards the earth.

" _Esdeath._ "

Her eyes shot open and instantly the world was transformed into something similar to the holding place for Alzora, only instead of the feminine Danger Beast meeting with her, it was Tatsumi. He had his hands in the pockets of his white jacket and he had a smile on his face, the sight of seeing him again causing her to feel such an overwhelming amount of joy and happiness she was left speechless.

"I'm glad you finally came to your senses. But right now we can't waste time. There's still one last enemy we have to deal with here, the last obstacle in our way from making the world safe for our daughter to live in."

Esdeath was thrown for a loop when the visage of Tyrant appeared behind Tatsumi with a toothy grin and its wings spread as far out as possible, the dragon preparing itself for what was about to happen.

"Just like my close friend Bulat told me a long time ago, it's moments like these where you need to shout, Esdeath. Shout it out at the top of your lungs!" he exclaimed, the fire inside of him spurring her on to grip Tyrannus tighter and tighter. "One final push, and we can finally stop fighting. One final push...and we can finally wash our hands clean of all the blood we've had to spill."

He walked up to her and threw his arms around her, Esdeath slowly closing her eyes and wrapping her arms around his waist in order to return his hug as tears streamed down her cheeks at his touch and the warmth he gave off, it's pure essence expunging the darkness and sorrow in her heart.

"Tyrant, take good care of her. She's the most precious thing I hold in my heart." said Tatsumi after he stepped back from Esdeath and faded away, leaving Tyrant behind with her.

" **You got it runt.** " replied the dragon before he raised a hand up to Esdeath and gave her a thumbs up. " **You ready to finish this, once and for all?** "

" _Yes...I'll finish this for you, Tatsumi! For our daughter!_ "

Suddenly, back in reality, Esdeath reared her dominant arm back and stabbed the Teigu's key down into the dirt, bellowing at the top of her lungs with every fiber of her very being, "TYRANNUS!"

As soon as the name of the Teigu was spoken a shockwave bigger then the one produced by Esdeath transforming with the power of Demon's Extract surged outward, followed by a huge ring of fire that came to life around her and furiously burned with unmatched rage. A column of flames shot up into the sky and from within the inferno emerged the visage of Tryant, the dragon unleashing a deafening roar that seemed to shake the very earth itself.

What happened next totally floored Wave and Maya, because after announcing its presence the Danger Beast actually shifted to the side and placed one of its clawed hands down on the ground to the right of Esdeath, and all of a sudden several large ice pillars sharpened to a point erupted from the earth in a semi-circle within the ring of fire. A second visage, this time of the female Danger Beast Alzora in her animalistic form emerged from the structures and slammed down her left hand adjacent from Tyrant's, and at the same time either Danger Beast lifted up their other arms and grasped each other's free hands tightly.

"What's that other creature there with Tyrant?!" asked Leone in awe of the spectacle, the lioness jumping when Arthur suddenly appeared behind her.

"It is the Danger Beast Demon's Extract was forged from, the infamous Scourge of the North. And now that I'm seeing it with my own two eyes, I finally remember what separated Tyrannus from not only the other five Armors, but from the rest of the 48 Teigu as well." he stated, everyone around him turning to hear the answer.

" **What is it?** " asked Wave after bringing his head down to their level.

"Tyrannus could not only adapt and evolve itself just like Tyrant...but it could evolve and grow more powerful by _fusing_ itself with other Teigu for a temporary amount of time. And in this case...Esdeath has fused Demon's Extract with Tyrannus to create a hybrid of the two that blends their abilities into one destructive weapon."

They were left in utter bafflement at the realization of just how powerful Esdeath would become when such a feat would complete. Wielding a single Teigu already required a strong individual, and dual-wielding Teigu took an even greater amount of power to effectively use them side by side. And then with Jacqueline, being able to simultaneously use three Teigu at once, namely Devil's Heart, Basilisk and Absordex, that was something unimaginable. But _fusing_ two Teigu into one weapon? That was impossible. It couldn't be done, but here it is, happening before their very eyes.

That's when Solomon noticed Esdeath was putting a lot of her weight on her uninjured leg and deduced that even with Tyrannus active, her broken leg would still hinder her, so after taking into account that Tyrannus was capable of fusing itself to other Teigu, he grinned and hunched over.

"Esdeath!" he bellowed, the former General glancing his way and watching as he split open his back and unleashed several large tendrils of his blood.

"Take them! Show her not to mess with us!" he shouted before sending the blood tendrils her way, Esdeath smiling and bringing up a hand , which in turn raised up the hand of Tyrant's visage to act as the receiver of the blood.

He absorbed every last drop and almost instantly a third visage of a monstrous bird with flaming wings, the almost mythological God Phoenix Vile Blood Curse was forged from, appeared from behind Alzora and Tyrant, literally adding more fuel to the fire that turned Esdeath into the most powerful Teigu user ever in existence.

Her face became covered by the helmet of Tyrannus and out from it formed two horns tipped with ice, the rest of the armor following suit. It had a dark blue color instead of the dark maroon and from its shoulder pauldrons came two ice shards, followed by a sash that hung around Esdeath's waist. Her long flowing blue hair was allowed to remain outside of the armor and it flapped wildly behind her while, within herself, thanks to the miracle healing properties of Solomon's Phoenix blood, she felt all of her injures vanish like she had never sustained them in the first place.

"Amazing…" murmured Maya when the three Danger Beasts disappeared, the wind around Esdeath calming down now that she had finished donning Tyrannus and fusing Vile Blood Curse and Demon's Extract to it.

"This is the turning point. Neither one of us can be considered human anymore. I've never been more excited in my life!" exclaimed Jacqueline with a grin as she pointed Murasame at Esdeath and unleashed a torrential maelstrom of power, the blackish purple aura condensing together and taking on the image of a demonic skeleton with a single glowing red eye that hovered just above her shoulder. "Let us see who truly is superior!"

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A/N Before you all hate on me for killing Tatsumi, just wait. Keep on reading. I promise. That's all I'm gonna say about that.


	47. Kill the Unkillable Foe

A/N Alright guys, allow me to announce a few things. One, I have posted the image of Esdeath in Tyrannus on the wiki not only on her profile page but also on the page for Tyrannus itself. Check it out. Secondly, and more importantly, the Part 2. I'm going to go ahead and break the news to you, Part 2 will most likely not be as long as this first part. My projections for the number of chapters show it being around 25 chapters. I'm not saying this is final, this is merely a prediction, but don't get your hopes up for a bloody long as fuck second part either. Okay, that's it, leave a fav and review!

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 **Chapter 46 - Kill the Unkillable Foe**

"Wave!" called out Esdeath, the dragon looking up with wide eyes when she addressed him in particular, the former General glancing his direction and motioning with her head at Tatsumi.

Wave understood what she wanted for him to do and he walked over, glaring at Jacqueline menacingly as he did before he reached down and carefully picked up Tatsumi's body with a single hand to carry him back to the Shikoutazer's head.

" **Good luck Esdeath. Make her pay.** " he said darkly before walking away, Esdeath looking back at Jacqueline and narrowing her eyes.

As they stared each other down, Esdeath held up her left hand and summoned a crystal of ice that she formed and constructed into the spear Neuntote, the weapon replacing her rapier since that had been broken earlier. She could feel such an overwhelming amount of power coursing through her veins from using three Teigu at once, and she couldn't help but smile when she sensed the three presences within her mind and body.

" _So you're the infamous Tyrant I've heard so much about. My name is Alzora, also known as the Scourge of the North._ "

" ** _Ah yes, that is I. I remember you from when I was still alive, but what of you newcomer?_** " asked Tyrant of the Danger Beast whom Vile Blood curse was made from.

" _My name is Athánati Flóga, but you may call me Athan. It's a resounding honor to meet all of you. I don't really talk too much, but I felt the need to introduce myself to legends such as you._ "

" _Indeed. Now let us focus on the task at hand, you two. Esdeath, our powers are yours to wield. Use them well._ " said Alzora, Esdeath nodding her head slowly and letting out a deep breath to relax her nerves and hone her focus and senses.

She stared at Jacqueline intensely when they slowly began to circle one another. It was superior versus subordinate, the strongest of the strong among all of those who had ever wielded a Teigu. But behind this blatantly obvious fact, there was so much more at stake then just the lives of each combatant. The fate of millions of people hung in the balance.

Suddenly Esdeath's body flickered and she vanished, Jacqueline gasping as she looked from right to left to try and spot Esdeath, but the former General was entirely too fast for her. In the blink of an eye she was on her right, her sudden appearance actually creating a sonic boom from how quick she was moving, and jabbed with the frozen Neuntote at her throat.

Jacqueline only had a split second to deflect the blade with Murasame, the sparks from them as they grinded against one another literally centimeters from her cheek. Esdeath growled as she hopped off her right foot and spun around, going in for a round-house kick that knocked Jacqueline back dozen of meters and created a dust cloud in the wake of her feet dragging across the ground. She didn't have time to breath easy when Esdeath cleared the distance in between them in a fraction of a second, her reaction to swipe at her armored opponent to dissuade her from attacking.

Instead she merely vanished and reappeared on her left, and when she swung at her again she sped away and came back this time on her right side.

"Why you...!" she snarled before dropping to her knees and hunching over, the ethereal skeleton being letting out a groan.

It grew five times its original size and lunged at Esdeath with a pitch black sword, the former General leaping back and flinging her hand towards it and Jacqueline.

"Grausturm."

Five immense ice pillars rocketed out of the earth all around Jacqueline, their razor sharp tips aimed straight at her and poised to crush her from their sheer size. The skeleton swung its blade around and hacked them all to pieces, which caused Esdeath to grow a pair of ice wings and soar up high into the sky with Neuntote levitating next to her.

Once she got high enough she leveled herself out and glared down at Jacqueline, the Great General narrowing her eyes and bending down a little in anticipation for the move she knew was coming next. Only, it wasn't quite the same.

"Massen Hagelsprung!" she bellowed before snapping her fingers, a flash of lightning appearing behind her figure from outside the ice dome when five humongous columns of ice manifested in a circle around her.

With a mere hand gesture she sent them flying back down to the ground at Jacqueline, who frantically rolled to the side to avoid being crushed by the first ice chunk. The second, third, fourth and fifth one narrowly missed hitting her as well, but when she was able to relax for a few seconds she noticed that they had all come down around her in a circle, forming a huge wall that enclosed her on all sides.

Esdeath grinned and swept both arms horizontally in front of her, generating dozens upon dozens of ice spears that lanced out from all of the ice columns. The skeleton around Jacqueline could only destroy so much before they got past its blade and began to impale her through every single part of her body, keeping her still so Esdeath could return to earth with Neuntote in her grasp.

Her feet touched the rubble-littered ground a foot in front of Jacqueline and she swept the edge of the spear down through her left shoulder and out of her left hip, flinging her blood in a wide arc after exiting her side. Jacqueline grunted and sucked up the pain before she used brute force to break herself out of the ice, Esdeath crouching down and producing a large ice pillar that carried the Great General high up into the air.

With her wings she chased up after her and came down on a platform of ice she created several meters away, another horn of ice sprouting from it and going after Jacqueline as soon as her hand touched it.

Jacqueline leaped off the ice column when the ice horn shattered its top half on impact and sprinted down it at her, Murasame glinting with the power of all of those who had been killed by the poisonous sword. Their blades grinded up against one another and produced a flurry of sparks, their eyes locked onto their opposite's.

"Going down!" said Jacqueline with a grin, Esdeath's eyes widening in surprise when the enteral skeleton reared its arm back at the same time she jumped into the air.

It slammed into the ice platform and sent Esdeath rocketing back to the ground with Jacqueline zooming after her, their connection with the earth sending up a plume of dust and smoke that obscured them from view by their observers. When the wind from the storm brewing above cleared it out, it showed Jacqueline standing over Esdeath with Murasame pressed hard down onto a barrier of ice hovering over her left arm.

With a yell she managed to break through the ice and actually pierced through Tyrannus to create a small cut in Esdeath's wrist, the former General growling as she kicked her old subordinate off of her and returned to her feet. She immediately felt the poison start to spread up her arm, and to Jacqueline's shock she held her arm up and used Neuntote to cut it clean off just above the bicep.

Jacqueline's grin was replaced with a scowl when thanks to the Phoenix blood coursing through her veins, Esdeath's arm grew back good as new and was immediately covered with Tyrannus when the armor itself repaired the damage it sustained. She flexed her fingers to test if everything worked properly before instigating the fight again just as a deafening boom of thunder echoed out across the land from outside the ice dome, as if the storm itself was growing in strength from their clashes.

From afar, their duel to the death was a graceful dance that astounded any who was watching, which is exactly what happened to Wave, Akame, Maya and the others.

"It's kind of beautiful...in a sense." murmured Chelsea in a low tone, Camilla and Solomon nodding their heads in unison.

"This is truly a battle of the best of the best, the most powerful ones among us." said Arthur while he crossed his arms, his gaze dropping to Tatsumi's body resting a few feet away from him. "It's a shame that Tatsumi was struck down…"

Maya slowly lowered herself down to her knees and folded her legs up underneath her, the others watching in silence as she pushed aside some of his hair hanging in front of his face while resting his head in her lap. She sniffed a little and struggled to keep herself from crying in front of everyone, but she remained strong and continued to hold onto Tatsumi while waiting for Esdeath to return to them so they could all say their goodbyes.

" **You know...we never could've gotten to this point if it weren't for him.** "

Everyone turned to look at Wave as he rested his body on the ground and turned his head to face them, his eyes resting on Tatsumi's body as he smiled.

"What do you mean?" asked Akame.

" **I mean, look at what's happened to us over the course of what, eight months? We were sworn enemies, the Jaegers being an organization created to take down Night Raid. But now, thanks to Tatsumi...we overstepped that line between friend and foe and came together as one. Esdeath and Najenda became friends again, Akame you and Kurome were able to forget your rivalry and pledges to kill one another.** " explained Wave before he let out a heavy sigh of sorrow.

"He's done so much for us and more...I don't think we'll ever be able to pay him back…" said Leone while she shifted her weight onto one leg and rubbed her arm.

As they stood there in silence to honor the memory and actions of their fallen friend, a crack of thunder from outside the ice dome drew their attention back to Esdeath and Jacqueline and the carnage their fight had wrought on the landscape around them.

Shattered pieces of ice littered the battlefield as well as crates made from the impacts of kicks and their bodies when either would throw their enemy down onto the ground, but thanks to their eager native capabilities, Jacqueline and Esdeath had not a single injury on their bodies. And they sure weren't close to tiring out yet, each still possessed a vast amount of power and energy left that could grant them the ability to fight for days on end.

"I'm going to ask you again. Stop fighting, it's over." asked Esdeath again as they stared at one another, Jacqueline wiping away some blood from her lip and growling.

"No, I'm not giving up. I was able to get this far because of those who I considered friends. I'm not going to let their sacrifices be in vain."

Esdeath narrowed her eyes and sighed, her dominate hand letting go of Neuntote so that she could use it alongside her other hand in removing her helmet from her head and throwing it away. She had finally stopped crying, but the determined look on her face almost exactly matched the one Jacqueline had and broadcasted to her that she wasn't even close to giving up either.

"I made a promise to end this fight, once and for all. I intend to do that right here, right now." she said as she raised her hand up to the sky, a swirling vortex of ice and snow coming to life around her when her tattoo began to glow. "Alter des Eis!"

A bright star-shaped shard of ice formed in the air directly above her extended middle finger before shooting off into the sky, a spiraling trail of snow being left in its wake as it rose higher and higher towards the very top of the ice dome Kahfka had created. When it got within a few feet of hitting the ice the shard exploded outward in a huge cloud of grey clouds and snow, Jacqueline bringing up an arm to shield her eyes as a viciously cold wind sprouted by the technique blew out across the ruined landscape and sent chills running up and down her spine. Once she opened up her eyes again she gasped upon seeing that everything underneath the ice dome had been blanketed by snow, with a miniature snowstorm now completely hiding the top of the ice dome from their view and making it appear they were all out on a frozen tundra.

"Whoa..." murmured Leone in awe after sticking out a hand and shivering slightly at the cold touch of a snowflake that touched the center of her palm.

Esdeath lowered her hand and inhaled deeply, a dark blue aura of energy beginning to seep out through her armor from the very core of her being as Demon's Extract responded to the change in environment and began to grow stronger from the ice and snow. Even Neuntote began to change, the spear's blade morphing into a three pronged trident with razor sharp tips. She gripped the weapon once again and aimed it right at Jacqueline, her eyes blazing with the raw power of an untamed Danger Beast staring down its prey in anticipation of the final attack...the killing blow.

"This is the end, Jacqueline!" she proclaimed before charging at her opponent, the Great General twirling Murasame around and setting her fit in order to defend against her.

"Bring it!"

Esdeath lunged with Neuntote and formed an ice sword in her other hand to use alongside the spear turned trident, catching her off guard on the back swing and cutting deep into her side with the blade. Jacqueline retaliated with a punch at Esdeath's jaw, but the attack missed and she retreated a good distance with a frown on her face when she delved deep into her thoughts to try and figure out just what could bring an end to their fight. She knew that Jacqueline could recover from any injury she dealt to her, and with Devil's Heart she could weaponize her bones easily and provide herself with a weapon at a moment's notice.

That's when it dawned on her. She finally knew how to stop Jacqueline, and when she pulled back again after clashing with her opposite she surprised her by letting go of her weapons and feigning an attempt to utilize a technique. The Great General, like she suspected, took the opportunity to try and land a blow on Esdeath, but the former General brought up her hands to the base of her chest where the tattoo of Demon's Extract was imprinted instead of planting them on the ground. A translucent orb of blue light manifested in between her palms directly above the tattoo and she focused on Jacqueline with an expression devoid of any emotion.

"Mahapadma." she said blankly, Jacqueline's eyes widening when she recognized the technique too late and was caught within it when the orb rapidly expanded and encompassed everything and anything around her, freezing space and time in the blink of an eye.

Esdeath let out a sigh as she dropped her hands and stared at the leading edge of Murasame hovering mere inches away from her throat, her gaze then moving to Jacqueline herself and the look of determination printed on her face. She sighed as Neuntote returned to her grasp and stepped back, ready to finally bring an end to this fight once and for all by killing their most hated enemy.

" _Do you think there's actually a chance?_ "

Esdeath bit her lip and thought back to that night with Tatsumi, the controversial question causing her to pause and look at Jacqueline with a close eye. Even though though she had already heard her say it, she found out that Tatsumi had been right to say that there was a deep sense of pain and sorrow in her eyes as a result of her childhood.

A few more moments of silence came and went before she cut through both of Jacqueline's knee caps, slashed through her abdomen, and then reared back with her free arm just as the technique begun to wear off. Her eyes widened in shock at the injures she now had suddenly and was left paralyzed from the instant rush of pain, and before Devil's Heart could heal them Esdeath lunged with her clawed hand right for the center of her chest.

Jacqueline gasped and made a sound reminiscent of a whimper when Esdeath's hand burst out of her upper back, the still beating Devil's Heart grasped tightly in her bloody fingers. All of the wires and tendons that had it had used to connect itself with her body had been severed, cutting it off entirely from the Great General.

Esdeath stared deep into Jacqueline's eyes as she ripped her arm back out of her chest still clutching onto Devil's Heart, a last few couple drops of blood oozing out of its ventricles before it stopped beating entirely.

"W-Why…?" asked Jacqueline after stumbling backward a few feet, the flame-like markings on her body fading away and her eyes returning back to their normal color.

Blood was gushing out of the hole in her chest and she was having immense difficulty breathing, the sudden removal of her Teigu wreaking havoc on her body since it had merged itself with her.

"Why...would you get in my way?!" she demanded, her hair now turning back to its original auburn color from the bleached white.

Esdeath dropped the mechanical heart and watched in silence when she collapsed down to her knees and coughed, spitting up more blood and writhing in agony.

"Because killing hundreds of thousands of innocent people is wrong. I know that better then anyone…" she replied before the stoic expression on her face became a pained one from the memories of her own sins. "I understand why you wanted revenge...watching your parents die in such a way is horrible. One of my friends experienced the same thing when she was younger...her parents were killed and crucified because of false charges the Prime Minister put on them."

"Then why didn't you help me…?" asked Jacqueline with tears in her eyes.

"We've all done horrible things, some of them unspeakable. And we all had a reason for committing them as well...but now, we're trying to right our wrongs so that we can at least atone for our sins. I killed over four hundred _thousand_ people by burying them alive. I listened to them scream and beg for mercy...but I payed no attention to them whatsoever." said Esdeath with a slight stutter, her own eyes beginning to tear up when she began to remember the screams of the men, women and children as they were thrown into the mass grave her own men had dug up.

At that moment while she was attempting to compose herself, Akame and the others ran over to where she stood since they could see that the fight was pretty much over now. However Wave maintained a cautious gaze on the Great General in case she tried to do anything suspicious, but he highly doubted she even could since without Devil's Heart she would be unable to use her bones as weapons and even heal herself for that matter.

"The reason why is because there's a line, one that separates justice from murder. We all gave up our old lives to kill the one person who deserved punishment more than anyone else, and that was Honest. Once he was dead, that would be the end of it. Killing innocent people just because they were citizens of the Empire would make you just as bad as him, Jacqueline." said Esdeath, her harsh words striking a chord within Jacqueline that caused her to lower her head and avert her gaze from them all.

"T-Then kill me…..if I'm compared to that monster, then I don't deserve to live…" she said in almost a whisper, Esdeath reaching for Neuntote and holding the spear with both hands.

She poised herself to send the sharpened blade down through Jacqueline's chest, but before she did she once again thought back to what she and Tatsumi had talked about. Then she noticed something in the background she hadn't seen since she had been so embroiled in her duel. It was Kahfka, just barely alive, and she had managed to roll herself onto her stomach and was looking at them both with tears streaming down her cheeks as she silently begged for her not to do it.

Her mind was screaming at her to finish the deed, to kill the person who had tortured, hurt, and murdered so many people. But when she looked back down at Jacqueline she felt her heart tighten up inside of her chest when instead of the Great General...she saw herself. That's when she had an epiphany. This whole ordeal is what would have become of her if she had never met Tatsumi, if she had never left the Empire, if she had remained who she once was...a sadistic and cruel person, no, a monster, who delighted in inflicting pain on others and watching them suffer.

And then she had another thought. What if instead of Tatsumi dying, he had lived? He would be standing right next to her, like he always had since they first began their relationship, but he wouldn't have just killed her. He would be standing here in the exact same spot she was, trying to save what remained of Jacqueline's twisted soul from the darkness that had consumed it for so long...just like what he had done to her.

" _Tatsumi...you are truly a wonderful human being..._ "

Jacqueline waited for the frozen blade to pierce her heart and end her suffering, but after a moment of dead silence it never came. She raised her head up and was shocked to see Esdeath let go of Neuntote and do away with it, instead dropping to her knees so that she was eye level with her and shook her head.

"No...I won't."

"Esdeath?" asked Chelsea in utter shock, the General sighing and glancing back at her and the rest of her friends.

"Too many people have already died...and I'm tired of it. No more senseless killing, no more revenge. I'm ending it all, here and now." was her only response to explain her actions. "Tatsumi and I talked of this before we even came to the capital. We all have done horrible things, all of them involving us ending the life of another human being who had just as much of a right to live as we did. And I'm not saying all of them were innocent, some off them well and truly deserved punishment, but…"

Esdeath returned to her feet and looked at them all directly, her expression showing them she had been thinking on this for quite some time now and that what she was saying was her true feelings on the matter.

"But if I learned anything from being with Tatsumi, I learned that everybody at least deserves a second chance...regardless of what they've done." she said before turning back to look at Jacqueline, who couldn't even comprehend what she was hearing right now. "However, the power to decide your fate doesn't just rest with me."

Esdeath crossed her arms and gazed at Akame, the assassin taking the hint and walking forward with Yatsufusa held tightly in her grip in remembrance of her sister as she approached Jacqueline and only stopped when she was a foot away from her. She glared at Jacqueline with an expression filled with such hate and such animosity it could've burned holes through her and into the ground.

Quick as a flash she drew Yatsufusa from its sheath and rested the blade atop Jacqueline's shoulder, the razor sharp edge only centimeters away from her neck.

"You have no idea how much I want to kill you right now..." she said darkly, the arm holding the sword beginning to shake from how hard she was gripping it. "You killed my little sister, the only real family I had left, and caused the deaths of so many of my precious friends..."

When it seemed like the tension in the air had finally reached its breaking point, Akame surprised them all yet again by taking away Yatsufusa and returning it to its sheath, the breath she had been keeping in coming out when she exhaled slowly and relaxed her nerves and muscles. Jacqueline was floored even more so then when Esdeath refused to kill her and she stared at Akame with wide eyes, wondering what could have possibly caused her to refrain from ending her existence.

"But like Esdeath said...too many people have already died. No more, just...no more." said Akame in a low tone, Esdeath grinning somewhat as she walked up to her and hugged her gently.

"I...I…I..." stuttered Jacqueline a couple of times before she totally and utterly broke down and cried, an infinite amount of weight lifting itself off of her shoulders. "I'm sorry...I'm s-so sorry…"

Esdeath motioned for Solomon to come over so that he could reabsorb the blood that had fused with Tyrannus, and when all of it had been removed she deactivated the armor and diffused Demon's Extract from it, the ice horns growing from her head vanishing. She blinked and her eyes returned to normal as she stabbed the key into the dirt next to her and bent down to help Jacqueline back to her feet when she had finally stopped crying.

"Solomon, could you please?" asked Esdeath, the Jaeger nodding as he prepared to give a vial of his blood to the Great General when, all of a sudden, she gasped when her wounds began to heal themselves.

Albeit it was at a much slower rate then if she had Devil's Heart in her, it was shocking nonetheless since even though the Teigu had been removed she was somehow returning to a healthy condition. When the hole in her chest filled itself with flesh and bone, Arthur rubbed his chin and pondered on how such a miracle could have occurred.

"Hmm...interesting. It would appear that a user of Devil''s Heart maintains its ability to heal themselves even if the Teigu itself is removed. Are you still able to use your bones as weapons?" he asked, Jacqueline sniffing and wiping the tears from her eyes before she opened her right hand and attempted to create a bone shard.

After a few moments, she did just that and marveled at how she still maintained her special abilities, but quickly she lost her surprise and looked down at the ground when Akame walked up to her with a scowl on her face. She had no idea what to say to the assassin since she had been the one to torture and kill Kurome, but after a few seconds of silence Akame's cold expression softened somewhat and she sighed heavily.

"Akame...I…"

"I'll accept your apology, but...I can't forgive you. Maybe after some time I might...but not now. If it wasn't for Esdeath and Tatsumi, I would've cut your head off." she said darkly, Jacqueline slowly nodding her head and averting her gaze from Akame's.

"Wave, could you do me another favor?" asked Esdeath with a glance up at the dragon.

" _What is it?_ " he asked, Esdeath pointing with her index finger at Kahfka.

He understood what she meant and he walked over to where she lie, a whimper emerging from her lips as he carefully picked her up and carrier her back over to where Solomon could give her some off his blood. She took it after being assured by Jacqueline and when she had fully recovered, she was helped back to her feet.

"Um...thanks…" she said awkwardly, Solomon merely nodding.

With that out of the way, Esdeath remembered Tatsumi and she was immediately at his side with Maya standing up and giving her some room to spend some time with him.

"If only there was something that could bring him back to life…" murmured Maya, Leone crossing her arms and shaking her head.

"There's no such thing, unfortunately. Wishing there was something like that is foolish." said Leone sternly, thinking back to when Sheele had been killed.

"Actually...I think I can help with that."

* * *

A/N Translations

Massen Hagelsprung - Mass Hail Pounce


	48. Welcome Home

A/N Yep. I just played that card. Jacqueline and Kahfka did not die, but based off the end of last chapter...I bet you guys can guess what is about to happen. Remember when I said keep on reading after Tatsumi had died? Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 47 - Welcome Home**

Everyone turned when they heard the new voice and watched in shock and awe as the child Emperor, who was beaten, a little bloody but otherwise perfectly fine, walk towards them without his crown and scepter with a regretful look on his face. He approached Esdeath and crouched down next to her, the former General wondering what he was going to do before he reached under his shirt and pulled out a necklace made of gold with a unique looking crystal hanging off the chain.

"What is that?" asked Chelsea, the Emperor removing it from around his neck and looking at it with a smile on his face.

"It was my father's necklace presented to him on the day he became Emperor, and it is only given to those within the Royal Bloodline." he explained just as the ran suddenly ceased when the storm moved on, small rays of sunshine beginning to peek out through the cloud barrier and illuminate the ruined capital.

"More importantly, it's a Teigu. What separates it from the rest, however, is that it was constructed after the original forty eight Teigu were finished."

"A forty ninth Teigu?" questioned Arthur in surprise, the child Emperor nodding. "What exactly does it do?"

"It's name is Ultimatum: Rex Tremendae, and while the Shikoutazer was named the Supreme Teigu...this one can only be considered as divine. The reason for this is that the only ability it contains is, if the Emperor so desires it, he could place this necklace around the neck of someone who had died and trade his life in order to bring that person back from the dead." said the Emperor as he looped the necklace around Tatsumi's neck, being sure to place the crystal in the direct center of his chest.

"It can only be used once...and I'm choosing to use it now, since I know that I will be persecuted for my actions against the Empire. It will be first and last act as the Emperor, without the Prime Minister controlling me."

He sat back on his legs with Esdeath across from him, a blanket of silence draping itself over the group as he closed his eyes and placed one hand on Tatsumi's chest above his heart and the other over his own. He inhaled deeply and cleared his mind, exhaling only when he was ready.

"As Emperor, I hereby activate Rex Tremendae." he stated clearly, and before their very eyes the crystal pendant began to emit a soft glow.

Everyone remained perfectly quiet when the light grew brighter and after a few moments of silence, lifted his hand off his chest and with a needle, provided by Chelsea, he cut a line across his palm and Tatsumi's opposite hand so that when he grasped it their blood could mix. The same faint light radiating from the necklace around Tatsumi'ss neck emerged from their hands and the Emperor let out a deep breath once more to ready himself for what was coming.

Suddenly he grunted a little when the Teigu began to do its work, which could only be compared to a miracle of God itself. The marks stretching across Tatsumi's body began to recede as Murasame's poison was sucked out of his bloodstream, transported down his arm and through the cut in his hand into the Emperor's body, where he himself began to suffer the effects of the certain-kill poison. Regardless of the pain he continued until the last drop of poison had been moved from Tatsumi's body to his, and when that was completed he let go of Tatsumi's hand and sat back on his legs with eyes only halfway open.

Then he began to chant in a language that only Arthur and Solomon could understand, an ancient language that was around during the first days of the Teigu. "Rex, Rex Tremendae majestatis, qui salvandos savas gratis, salves eum, fons pietatis."

He let out a single, long and drawn out breath and to everyone's utter shock they watched Tatsumi do the exact same thing, as the very essence of life from the Emperor had escaped his lips and went into Tatsumi's to literally breathe life back into him.

"I-It is done…" murmured the Emperor with a cough as the light from Rex Tremendae faded away, the crystal's bright blue color shifting to a pitch black to show its single use had been fulfilled.

Esdeath looked from the young boy back down to Tatsumi and she instantly felt the warmth she had grown to love come back to his skin, and when she lowered her head down to his chest she couldn't believe her ears when she heard the steady beat of his heart.

"H-His heart...it's beating...he's alive…" she said after bringing her head back, and not even a few seconds later Tatsumi's eyes fluttered and slowly opened, their green color now back since Tyrannus had been diffused from him.

"Ugh...my head feels like Wave stepped on me…"

" **Not funny.** "

His eyes shot wide open and he immediately pushed himself up so that his back was straight and looked up at the dragon, Wave glaring at him with an expression that told him he wasn't amused. What shocked him though was that he was damn sure he had been killed by Jacqueline, but here he was, seemingly alive and amongst all of his friends...and more importantly Esdeath.

He brought his eyes down to her and he opened his mouth to say something, but words weren't even needed when she threw her arms around his neck and embraced him as fresh tears began to roll down her cheeks. Not wanting to interrupt her, he only closed his eyes and began to stroke her hair gently until she had shed all of her tears and started to calm down.

"Don't you _ever_ do that again…" said Esdeath before she cupped Tatsumi's cheeks and kissed him, the passion and life he radiated soothing her soul.

When she pulled away he turned around and came to see the child Emperor on the verge of death sitting a foot away from him, a small smile on his face. He still didn't have any idea on how he was alive, but when he saw the black marks on the kid's skin and the absence of the poison in his system as well as the necklace hanging around his neck, he guessed what must have occurred and nod his head in thanks.

"Thank you...your Highness."

"Y-You're welcome...and as a f-final request,please, look after my parent's nation for me…" replied the child Emperor before he shivered and collapsed onto his side, the poison finally reaching his heart and killing him.

Tatsumi nod his head once and promised to fulfill the redeemed Emperor's final wish, then stood up and helped Esdeath back to her feet, Akame, Camilla and Chelsea each hugging him to welcome him back while Leone grinned and did her usual head-lock hug that pressed his face right up against her breasts.

"Good to have you back you knucklehead." she said, Tatsumi rolling his eyes when she let go so that Solomon could pat him on the back and Maya could give him another hug.

When everyone had gotten in their greetings, Tatsumi finally turned around and noticed Jacqueline and Kahfka standing a few feet away separated from the group, with Jacqueline especially making sure she had her gaze averted. He glanced at Esdeath and asked without speaking if she was friendly, Esdeath nodding her head once, before he walked over with his hands in his pockets.

"Jacqueline."

She didn't respond and only shuffled her feet a little, her silence causing him to frown and bring out one of his hands to rest on her shoulder. When she finally looked up, her expectations being he would be scowling or angry at her for killing him, she was surprised so he wasn't any of those things. In fact, he had a smile on his face that for some reason made her feel at ease...like there was nothing she had to worry about any more.

"I see you were finally able to come to your senses." he said before taking his hand off her shoulder.

"I want to say sorry...but but that doesn't even come close to being able to make up for everything I've done…"

Tatsumi slowly nod his head in understanding before Jacqueline stepped away from them so she could stand next to Kahfka, who had remained quiet all of this time.

"Yes, that is true. And there are a lot of people outside of this dome that would do anything to see you hung for your crimes. It's going to take a long while for people to move on past what happened here today and what you did, especially us."

"That's why...we're just going to leave. We won't come near any of you and hurt anyone else…"

"I...want to apologize too. Jacqueline and I share a lot of things, including our mutual hate for the Empire. I wanted to help her, and so did the Inquisitor too." spoke up Kahfka while toeing the rubble at her feet with her toes, Leone grinning at her and placing a hand on her hip.

"Just know that the next time this happens I'll beat you to a pulp."

Kahfka snickered lightly at the humor-laced threat and shifted her weight onto the other leg, giving her a grin of her own and saying, "I wouldn't bet on that."

With that Kahfka created several ice shards around her ankles and arms to grant her the ability to fly, and before she produced the same effect for Jacqueline, she looked at Tatsumi and Esdeath for the last time and gave them both a warm-hearted smile.

"Esdeath, Tatsumi...thank you. Maybe someday...we can meet again."

She then turned away from them and left the Imperial Palace grounds with Kafka, the two disappearing over the wall to escape the capital before they were noticed and attacked after she had lowered the ice dome. When the ice dome came down they found that the storm had finally subsided and that the dark clouds above the city had begun to disperse, small rays of sunshine coming down through the gaps. Tatsumi had to shield his eyes from the bright glow when one appeared directly above them, the others looking up to the sky and watching with smiles as more and more of the bright blue sky was revealed.

"We did it. We actually did it." said Chelsea with a sigh of relief, Tatsumi wrapping an arm around Esdeath's shoulders and bringing her close to him.

"Yeah…" he replied for all of them as the sun's rays bathed them in its warm touch.

" _Najenda, everyone...the Empire...we were able to free it. We did it. We finished it for you._ "

Once they returned their gaze to the earth Esdeath got a slight chill up her spine and frowned upon discovering its source resting a few feet away from them on the ground. She flicked her wrist and a shard of ice manifested around the motionless Devil's Heart so that there wouldn't be any danger if one of them were to hold it.

"Before we do anything else, let's make sure we lock this thing up for good in the Teigu Vault."

"Agreed."

 **\- Nightfall -**

Now that the reign of the Prime Minister had ended, the Empire's people alongside their liberators switched their focus to the long period of rebuilding their broken capital they all knew would follow after the revolution had come full circle. Thankfully, the cleanup of the broken remains of the Shikoutazer was accomplished easily with the help of the four airships Camilla had with her army since they could use tethers to lift them out of the city.

By the end of the day all of the rubble and debris that occupied the Imperial Palace grounds had been taken to the capital's outskirts to be disposed of at a later date, and with weary bodies drained both physically and mentally the people and the army that had liberated them all retired to their tents or houses to rest.

As the sun began to set, however, the remaining Jaegers, Leone and Akame were still outside the capital's walls with Rafe and Fiona, whom they had learned from the two that they and a significant portion of the Hellraisers were able to survive the obliteration of the Shisuikan and Hræsvelgr thanks to the Lieutenant Colonel. However their primary reason for being there was for Wave, with Tatsumi, Esdeath, Maya, Akame and Wave meeting the Doctor that had first diagnosed him when Grand Chariot began to consume him three days earlier.

"Well, it's exactly as what it looks like. Even though Grand Chariot took over your body, through some means he was able to subjugate the portion of Tyrant within the Teigu and remain himself even though his body turned into that off the dragon itself." said the Doctor while he removed Perfector from his hands.

"But is there a way that he can turn himself back?" asked Maya, the man fixing his gaze on her and sighing.

"Unfortunately, I don't know. If there is, then I have no knowledge of it, because from my scans it clearly states that your friend is no longer a human, but a true-blooded Danger Beast."

"Actually, young one, there is a way."

"Kaminari? Why are you here?" asked Tatsumi when the dragon flew down from the sky to land before them, his single eye looking at him and then up to Wave.

"I came to help comfort the citizens of the Empire, since I cannot sit idly by and watch them try to recover from these troubled times on their own." he replied. "But now, more importantly, I know of a way for your friend to become human again, more or less."

" **What is it?** " asked Wave.

"I do not exactly remember the whole story, but very long ago during ancient times, there was a certain species of Danger Beasts that developed a method to transform themselves into a human form so that they could walk among humanity. I was able to learn of this technique from an old friend of mine, and since you are now a Danger Beast, Wave, I will teach it to you. I will go first so that you may see it for yourself.

Kaminari walked over to Wave and sat directly across from him, the others taking a step back to give them some room for whatever would come next. Kaminari closed his eyes and took in a deep breath to steady himself, and when he was relaxed, he began to recite the method to successfully perform the technique.

"Take in, comprehend, and feel all of the power flowing around inside of you. See yourself as the mighty Danger Beast, a being with unmatched raw strength that cannot be controlled." he said with a calm tone, Wave watching him closely to make sure that when he would perform the technique he would get everything right.

"Now, take that power and begin to mold and shape it, compress it down into a smaller and smaller form.

Everyone gasped when Kaminari began to glow brightly, and before their very eyes he began to shrink, his long body losing its tail when it compressed itself and his arms and legs moving to different positions. When he was just a fraction of his former size the light finally faded away and revealed Kaminari as a middle aged man with a light complexion, sharp facial features, tousled grey hair and thin brown eyes. He wore an unzipped black suit over a buttoned vest and green shirt, long dark green pants, black trouser shoes, shaded glass spectacles, and a green cowl around his neck that bore a purple cross-shaped pin.

"Ah...it has indeed been a long time since I was able to enter this form." said Kaminari as he rolled his shoulder and popped his neck before looking up at Wave and smiling.

"Now it is your turn. Just do exactly as I said."

Wave nod his head and closed his eyes, taking a deep breath and relaxing his whole body so that he could focus. He recited the words the elder Danger Beast had spoken in his head and sure enough, even though it didn't happen as quickly as with Kaminari, the faint glow emerged from the center of his chest and enveloped his body from the bottom of his feet to the very top of his head.

Then his body began to shrink, his massive wings folding up and morphing with his back entirely alongside his tail, until at the very end he had returned to the same size as everyone else when the light faded away and he was left standing there back to his normal self.

"Well done Wave, excellent job." congratulated Kaminari with a warm smile after Wave checked himself over to ensure everything was where it needed to be.

"Now, I will tell you. Performing this technique does not mean you have returned to being human." stated the Danger Beast upon walking up to him and placing a hand on his shoulder. "As a result of your fusing with Grand Chariot and your subjugation of the portion of Tyrant's being that existed within the armor, you have well and truly become a Danger Beast. There is nothing that can change that, unfortunately."

"It doesn't matter. He's still Wave, simple as that."

Akame walked up to the both of them and when he saw the look in her eyes, Kaminari smiled and nod his head out of respect for her opinion before he stepped back and returned to Esdeath and Tatsumi's side.

"Are you sure you're okay with me being a Danger Beast?" asked Wave after Akame gave him a hug, the assassin smiling at him and nodding her head.

"I don't care if you're human or Danger Beast, you're still you." she replied before, to Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya's mild amusement, she pulled Wave into a heartfelt kiss.

Wave caught a glimpse of them and watched as Tatsumi gave him a thumbs up and a grin, Esdeath catching the gesture and rolling her eyes. When they were finished they returned to the city with Leone and the others, who had bid their farewells to Rafe and Fiona, and with Esdeath taking the lead she led them through the winding streets to a place they thought they would never return to.

"Wow...so it is still here." marvelled Wave when they walked through the front gates of the mansion that used to act as their headquarters when they were still loyal to the Empire.

"You know, to think we'd all come back here. It's like it came around full circle." said Leone in reference to when they had first fought here in the very courtyard they were standing in all those months ago.

"Yeah…" murmured Tatsumi at the memory, the group standing there for a few more minutes to reminisce before they walked inside and diverged out to find themselves rooms.

Tatsumi and Esdeath climbed up the familiar set of stairs they had walked up and down so many times before and arrived at their old room in the mansion. She opened the door and walked inside first, taking in the familiar smells of the interior while Tatsumi walked over to the bed and grinned upon seeing the sheets were still in proper condition and hardly touched.

"So this was your room…" said Maya when she suddenly popped her head through the doorway, Esdeath looking back at her over her shoulder and motioning for her to come in.

"Yeah, we have a lot of good memories here in this mansion and this room especially." she said

"And now that Honest is gone, all of us have a chance to make new, happier ones since we won't have to worry about any more of the troubles he produced for the Empire." he said with a smile before yawning, Maya and Esdeath watching him yawn one last time before he collapsed onto the bed sheets and immediately fell asleep just from exhaustion alone.

Esdeath and Maya crept over to him to see if he was actually asleep, and when they each poked his exposed cheek and still he didn't move an inch, they both giggled and gave each other the same look when they shared a thought.

An unknown amount of time passed by until Tatsumi was awoken with a start when he felt a heavy weight plop down onto him, and after letting out a groan he opened his eyes and wasn't even surprised to see that it was Esdeath who was on top of him. He also wasn't surprised to see that she was utterly naked, so when she gave him that grin of hers he rolled his eyes sighed.

"Really? Now? And what time is it anyways…?" he asked.

"Who cares about the time? All that matters now is what's happening right now...and what *will happen later." she replied lustfully with a wink, Tatsumi recognizing that glint in her eyes before he gasped when something warm and wet wrapped itself around his member.

"Uh...Esdeath?" He asked, his wife's grin only widening before she picked her rear end up a little so that he could look through her legs.

"Maya?! Why are you here?!"

The lavender haired girl responded to her name when she brought eyes up to his and removed her lips from his cock, her fingers remaining around his shaft as she ran her hand slowly up and down it. She was sitting on her elbows and knees and was also completely naked, and now that he was staring directly at her she blushed heavily and said, "Sorry...I couldn't resist…"

"Tatsumi, while you were asleep for the last hour, I had a talk with Maya. We decided to come to an agreement that would benefit both of us, and obviously you." said Esdeath, Tatsumi returning his gaze to her. "She has no one else to go to, so she's going to stay with us."

"What do you mean?"

"We're going to share you." said Maya in a sing-song tone.

"And I'm guessing I have no choice in this matter?" asked Tatsumi of them both when Esdeath rested her arms on either side of his head and had her face a few inches away from his.

"Nope." she said with a giggle before she kissed him, Tatsumi rolling his eyes again before he accepted the fact and allowed this to happen.

Maya started to suck on his cock again and closed her eyes as she pleasures herself and Tatsumi at the same time, her tongue even coming into play when she licked the tip of his head. Unconsciously her right hand snaked down under her stomach and she started to tease herself with her fingers, sensually rubbing the folds of her sex to bring even more ecstasy coursing through her system. While that was happening Esdeath had finished her kiss with Tatsumi and had arched her back a little to give him full access to her breasts, a man escaping from past her lips when he nibbled softly on one of her nipples and rolled the other in between his thumb and index finger.

When he finally reached his climax Maya let out a moan of pleasure when his semen unloaded into her mouth, and when it ended she removed her lips from him and shivered somewhat as the unorthodox liquid slipped down her throat after gulping it down. Esdeath glanced over her shoulder and grinned when she saw that he was finished, she pulled herself away from Tatsumi and turned around so that she could grab Maya by the shoulders and push her down onto her back while she sat overtop of her on her hands and knees while Maya had her legs spread eagle.

Their breasts pressed up against one another and Esdeath looked at Tatsumi with a mischievous grin, her left hand reaching back and grabbed her left ass cheek.

"Tatsumi...choose between us." she asked, Tatsumi's blush becoming even redder at the sight of her dripping wet sex up against Maya's.

"Esdeath, you…"

"There are two gorgeous women who love you with all their heart sitting before you. Not only that, they yearn for you, Tatsumi…" started off Esdeath, Maya continuing where she left off.

"Please, we want you...I-I want...I want to have your child…" she said with a stutter and a blush redder then the reddest tomato.

Tatsumi couldn't help but chuckle at her timidness, even though she had already had the experience of having sex previously. He picked himself up and approached them both before he rested a hand at the base of Esdeath's back and another on her left hip, a on her hip, the tip of his erect member rubbing her entrance.

"What am I going to do with you two?"

Meanwhile further down the hall Wave had been unable to will himself to sleep even though he was in his old room, and so he sat there under the covers with his eyes glued to the ceiling and his hands resting on his chest.

" _So...I'm a Danger Beast now…_ " he thought to himself as he raised up on hand and looked at it for a few moments, remembering when just a couple hours earlier it had been tough-as-nails scales.

Suddenly a knock resonated from his door and jumped a little at first before he sighed and called for whoever was outside to go ahead and enter. He was surprised when the door creaked inward and Akame appeared in the doorway with nothing but a plain white shirt and a grey pair of

"Uh, are you okay?" asked Wave after pushing himself up into the sitting position.

Akame didn't reply when she closed his room door and remained silent as she walked over and stood a foot away from him at the side of his bed.

"I...can't sleep…" she said finally while poking the ends of her index fingers together anxiously. "Um...c-could I stay in here…?"

"Yeah, sure."

He scoot over in the bed so she could pull open the covers and climb in next to him, Wave returning them to their proper position when she had situated herself. They laid down with their backs facing one another and stayed like that for a few moments before Wave closed his eyes and took it upon himself to break the ice.

"Akame?"

"Yes?"

"Why did you really come into my room?" he asked out of curiosity and suspicion.

Akame turned herself over onto her other shoulder and faced Wave, seeing that he had also done the same thing, and ended up with her face resting less then a foot away from his. She stared into his eyes, which were no longer normal but were the same as Tatsumi's in that the pupil was the characteristic cross slit, and smiled since he had seen right through her lie.

"You already know the answer to that, Wave."

She brought a hand up and cupped a hand to his cheek before she kissed him, the warm fuzzy feeling in her chest blooming into a full-blown flower glowing with life as they allowed themselves to give in to their love. Soon after as they continued to kiss Akame began to push herself up and over Wave when he rolled onto his back, her knees digging into the bed on either side of his hips.

They finally were able to pull apart and Akame blushed heavily with a smile as she leaned back and sat herself down on his midsection, Wave unable to say anything as she traced a finger across the center of his chest.

"Wave…" she asked before her fingers curled up underneath the rim of her shirt and she began to mess around with it, scrunching it up out of nervousness "I-I…I..."

He could see that she was having difficulty expressing these newfound feelings of hers, since almost all of her life had been filled with death, despair and vengeance, and he couldn't help but smile a little at her awkwardness. She gasped a little when he leaned up and cupped one of her cheeks with a single hand, his eyes gazing into hers and causing a feeling of calm to wash through her system.

"I love you, Akame."

Akame's eyes widened a fraction of inch before she smiled and wrapped her arms around his neck so that she could kiss him again, her body pressing itself up against his chest as they fell back onto the bed. After his back hit the sheets again she let go of his neck and slipped off her panties while Wave took off her shirt and discarded it, Akame's heart skipping a beat when she returned to the straddling position and felt embarrassed now that she was completely naked before him.

"Akame...you are absolutely beautiful." said Wave in awe of her womanly yet physically fit body and ample sized breasts.

Her blush came back even redder then before from the compliment, but she smiled still and lifted herself up with her legs in order to reach down and slip her index finger under the rim of Wave's boxers.

While the fun for them had only just begun, back in Tatsumi and Esdeath's shared room its occupants had retired for the night and were laying atop the bed sheets to rest their tired bodies. Tatsumi was in the center, on either side of him were Esdeath and Maya with their heads on his chest, and they each had a smile on their face because of the night's events.

"Tatsumi, you better take responsibility for this.." said Maya lovingly as she gently rubbed her stomach, feeling the semen within her womb.

"Why wouldn't I?" he asked with a grin, Maya scooting herself up a little on the bed so that she could share a kiss with him.

She then nestled her head in the crook of his neck and closed her eyes, falling into a deep sleep a few seconds later. Tatsumi turned his head and found that Esdeath was now right up next to him like her, and with his hand he stroked her hair and took in its familiar smell before they settled themselves in for the night and fell asleep.

 **\- One Week Later -**

A week passed by and reconstructions efforts within the Imperial Capital were well underway, and at the behest of the Lord, Thernadier and Camilla, a large portion of the Imperial Cemetery was separated from the rest of the area and transformed into a special shrine where, after searching far and wide for them with help from those who knew them, the fallen members of the Jaegers and Night Raid would have a permanent home.

Once construction of the gated off area had been completed, Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya were the first three to go and see their friends in their final resting place. Tatsumi was wearing his usual apparel as was Maya, but Esdeath had instead shed her General's clothing and had worn a yellow dress with a frilled hemline. Upon passing underneath the marble archway guarding the entrance they came to a semi-circle shaped clearing of freshly cut grass that from which headstones marked for every single one of their friends were erected.

Esdeath personally walked up to one engraved with Najenda's name and looked at it for a few seconds, Tatsumi right beside her with a comforting arm around her shoulder in case she couldn't take being among their fallen comrades.

"Najenda, we...we kept our promise. The Empire is free, and Honest is dead." said Esdeath with a smile, Tatsumi slowly nodding his head.

"And I hope that you can understand our choice to spare Jacqueline and Kahfka as well." he added on while Esdeath took something out from behind her back and unfolded it, revealing that the object was the overcoat emblazoned with the symbol of Night Raid that she would wear.

She wrapped the coat around the base of Najenda's headstone and after giving one finally goodbye under her breath, returned to Tatsumi's side, Maya coming over and giving her a hug.

"I knew you guys would be here."

They turned and each gave a mile when Camilla and Solomon appeared at the entrance to the shrine, the Princess wearing her casual attire of a pair of jeans and her grey keyhole sweater. She shoved her hands in her pockets and walked with Solomon over to them, Tatsumi raising an eyebrow out of intrigue as to why they would come to meet them at a cemetery.

"Why are you guys here? Don't you think it's a little weird to meet someone at a cemetery?"

"Well, I just thought we'd bring someone who wants to see you over *to you instead of the other way around." said Solomon with a grin before he motioned with his thumb back to the gate, Tatsumi and Esdeath following its trajectory and watching as Wilhelm emerged from behind one of marble support columns for the archway.

As soon as they caught a glimpse of the light blue fabric in his arms they instantly realized who and what was within them. "Lucena!"

Wilhelm laughed when they pretty much sprinted at him to see their daughter after being separated from her for such a long time. The Lord Commander handed her gently over to Esdeath and she smiled as she caressed her tiny cheek with her finger, Lucena's nose shriveling up as she let out a tiny whimper since her touch had awoken her from her slumber.

"She was an absolute angel." said Wilhelm when Tatsumi gently ran a hand through the small tuft of light blue hair on Lucena's hair.

"We can't thank you enough for doing this, but really, thank you." he said, the Lord Commander nodding his head after holding his hands behind his back.

"Of course, it was my pleasure. But there was one thing that I discovered, something that would prove to be highly interesting to you two."

"What's that?" asked Esdeath.

Wilhelm pointed to the base of his neck and motioned for her to check Lucena, Esdeath glancing at Tatsumi with a confused look on her face before he reached over and pulled down the edge of the blanket she was wrapped in. They both gasped when staring right back at them on Lucena's chest was the very same tattoo Esdeath had on her, which could mean one thing and one thing only.

"She...she was born with Demon's Extract in her blood?"

"It's not just in her blood, it's present throughout her entire system. It seems that with her being your daughter, she inherited the abilities you gained as a user of Demon's Extract naturally. That tattoo appeared a week ago and ever since then at sporadic moments small ice crystals would materialize in the air around her." explained Wilhelm, Tatsumi and Esdeath marvelling at the tattoo and immediately thinking of the future and that there was a possibility that she could become even stronger then her.

"My little Lucena…" said Esdeath before she hugged Lucena just a little bit tighter, wanting to bring her as close to her heart as physically possible. "Welcome home."

* * *

A/N The sentence the Emperor speaks to revive Tatsumi is in fact Latin, and it is a slightly altered version of the lyrics taken directly from the fifth movement - Rex Tremendae majestatis - of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Requiem Mass in D Minor. The original lyrics have "me" in the spot where I inserted "eum", which is Latin for "Him". Here are the lyrics translated.

"Rex, Rex Tremendae majestatis, qui salvandos savas gratis, salves eum, fons pietatis."

"King, King of Tremendous majesty, who freely saves those worthy ones, save him, source of mercy."


	49. Dawn of a New Age

A/N It's time everyone, the end of the First Part is upon us. Let's finish off strong and then move on to the next part. Whew...longest story I've ever written too, good grief, and managing this as well alongside College and such is an effort, but I'm still pulling it off. The reason why is I love writing to the point I would always fill up at least two composition notebooks full of story stuff every school year, and that I always have ideas going through my head.

I've thought of writing stories for Arpeggio of Blue Steel, which actually might happen, Black Bullet, Gurren Lagann, the list goes on. I even had a fleeting thought of writing one for Clannad, but that was quickly dismissed because I knew I wouldn't be able to reproduce the SOUL CRUSHING, GUT WRENCHING, HEART TWISTING FEELS that show induced on to me. When I finished watching Akame ga Kill and had the idea for this story, I'll tell you the truth, I was SO unsure of myself and that if I could do this, since I didn't have as much knowledge on it like I had about Naruto and such. The creative imagination came later, and I started to really get it going with the plot and all, but as time went on from when I first started writing this story, the biggest reason why I kept going is because it makes my day when I read the reviews some of you guys leave me (I wish ALL OF YOU PEOPLE would leave one, but oh well, can't get them all I guess) and watching how you guys react to the characters and the actions they take.

Some of them are funny, like one from a certain user **Kurome4Ever** screaming in bold letters "GIVE ME HER BLOOD. SHE TORTURED AND KILLED MY BUNNY. FOR THAT, I DEMAND HER BLOOD" when Kurome died, and I couldn't stop laughing for a good few minutes because of that. Then there was **ChaosOmega8** saying flat out he f-ing loves this story, **Archangel677** saying that I've written his favorite Akame ga Kill story he's ever read, and so much more from you guys. The question I posed about Jacqueline brought some interesting views to light as well because I got to see what you guys thought personally, like how some wanted her to die, and some wanted her to live, and then there was **Nitestalker365** saying she deserved to live and then immediately after I upload the chapter when she kills Tatsumi you changed that thought HELLA QUICK. That review was hilarious to read.

What I'm trying to say really is that I am shocked, no utterly and completely astounded by how much emotion and other things I was able to bring out from you guys by writing this and how you guys have wanted to read this story among all the other ones out there, and that just saying this is your favorite or how it's such a good story and all just floors me to the point all I can say is "Wow.". So guys, long story made short, thank you so much for all of the stuff you've said in your reviews thus far and as we move on I hope you guys will continue to do so

Carrying on, what might end up happening is that there will be a week-long hiatus between this chapter and the start of part 2 because I gotta work to get all of the story crud up onto the wiki for the characters and making sure everything relevant to Part 1 is up there and such. It's a lot of work, I know, but I'll try to get it done as soon as possible so that I can continue on with this story. I'm also working on drawing all of the new characters that will be introduced in Part 2 as well, and I already have some of them completed. It's gonna be great. Thanks for the understanding.

So guys, leave a fav and review, and I will see you guys in Part 2!

* * *

 **Chapter 48 - Dawn of a New Age**

One year passed since the fall of the corrupt Empire and the deaths of Prime Minister Honest and the child Emperor, and since then a lot of things have occurred and changed. A few months after the revolution's end, after things stabilized in the Imperial Capital and reconstruction was well underway, Solomon, Camilla, Wilhelm and Chelsea, who had grown to love Straelka during her time there, returned with their army back across the great ocean that separated the two nations. News arrived a week later saying that Solomon and Camilla had married, the two becoming the new Kaiser and Kaiserin of the Kingdom and that Camilla herself was pregnant with a child, a boy.

Soon after that Wave and Akame married and then left the Empire on the boat the former's parents owned, the Jaeger keeping his promise to her by taking her on a trip around the world to see places things she never has before. Until a suitable replacement for leader of the Empire could be found, Arthur stepped up to act as interim Emperor for the time being and was soon loved by the people once again for his compassion and good nature, just like all those years before when he had ruled Avalon and created the Empire alongside his twin brother.

Fiona, Rafe, and Kaminari, alongside the remainder of the Western Nations' army and the surviving Hellraisers, returned to their home now that their jobs had been completed and proceeded to focus on their rebuilding of their own nation after the invasion that had occurred several months prior. Leone was able to bring Lubbock, who had received his prosthetic leg to replace the one he had lost, back to the Imperial Capital and tell him everything that had happened as well as bringing him to the shrine constructed for their friends. Soon after he joined the ranks of the reformed Imperial Military while Leone joined in on helping the people of the Empire who were less fortunate then most recover from the devastation the Shikoutazer had wrought on the city.

Then, a couple of months before the one year anniversary of the day the revolution had ended, Esdeath and Maya gave birth to two daughters, whom were named Selena and Juno. Of course Tatsumi could only chuckle and rub the back of his neck nervously when questioned about it by everyone, especially Lubbock, but the matter soon passed.

And finally, as promised, Jacqueline and Kahfka vanished without a trace and were never seen or heard from again by anyone. Among those who knew that they were actually alive and not dead, they could only guess where they had gone to.

Now, one year later, the Empire as whole has recovered somewhat from the Revolution and was more or less back on its feet. At the behest of the people and his friends, Arthur remained as the current Emperor even though he said he wouldn't, and since then its only gotten better. Trade between the Empire and its neighbors resumed after such a long time, and Straelka taking it a step further by sharing the technology it had developed on its own with its allies as well as a lot of its own culture that quickly spread like wildfire and built up an enormous reputation within the Empire and beyond.

With a recommendation from Arthur, Maya took took up the reigns of being Great General like she had always wanted ever since she was young and performed huge feats that turned the Empire's military into a fearsome fighting force blending Teigu users and technology gained from Straelka. And Esdeath, she saw personally the destruction of the Reconditioning Department so that no one would ever have to be sent to such a hellish place ever again. She never returned to the military and instead took up residence with Tatsumi and Maya in the mansion given to the Jaegers, living in peace with Lucena, Selena and Juno without worry.

What they had all fought for, a world where not only their children but the children of the entire next generation could grow up in without worry, had finally been realized. All of the blood, sweat, and tears...and all of the friends and loved ones who had given the ultimate sacrifice, it all led to this moment in time.

The dawn of a new age.

 **\- 20 Years Later -**

"Today is a beautiful day, wouldn't you say so?"

Arthur took in a deep breath of fresh air as he look up at the clear blue sky from the top balcony of the Imperial Palace, the gentle rays of the sun hitting his bare skin and warming him up inside. He hadn't changed much over the last 20 years except for becoming older and wiser, visible wrinkles appearing underneath his eyes and that he had received a new body just like his previous one only he had regained the arm he had lost.

Standing a few feet away from him was a young woman in her early twenties with a fair complexion, lavender colored hair and a set of different color eyes, the left one blue and the right one green. Underneath her left eye was a tattoo made of three small black diamond shaped markings that grew smaller the closer they got to her ear, and she had a single silver stud earring in each ear.

Her hair was tied up in a bun at the rear left corner of her head, causing her bangs to fall the right side of her face and leaving a small curled lock that reaches below her left ear to her shoulder. Her attire of dress consisted of a more formal style fitting for a politician or someone within the Empire's government, which was in fact exactly what she was.

"Yes, your Highness. It is." she replied with a small smile, Arthur glancing back at her and chuckling.

"I told you that when we're alone you can call me by my name, Juno. I understand that as Prime Minister you need to act the part, but not all the time." he said, the woman shuffling her feet and losing the rigidity in her stance.

"O-Okay, Arthur. Sorry."

Arthur chuckled again as he approached her and placed a hand on her shoulder, saying, "You don't have to apologize. But we can worry about that later, right now I need you to go get your sister. She should be at the Shisuikan right about now directing her troops alongside Selena's for when they head out to the North to help quell the turmoil there."

Juno nod her head and she left the Emperor's side and disappeared through a door, Arthur returning to looking out over the Imperial Capital and marveling at how much it has changed since the days of old.

" _My Avalon, to think you would grow into something as monumental as this._ " he thought when a soft breeze passed over him.

With help from their new allies, the Empire had recovered greatly from the state it was in when Honest was alive. Some of the accomplishments were the near total annihilation of poverty and famine in the capital, the outrageous taxes implemented were abolished and replaced with a more fair rate that everyone could agree too, and the city itself had entered a new golden age of science and technology thanks to the Kingdom of Straelka ending its isolationism practice and sharing its knowledge with the world.

" _I wonder how everyone is doing?_ "

Down below at the entrance to the rebuilt palace Juno left through the doors held open by two members of the Imperial Guard, and with a smile she thanked them.

She had learned that When the Empire had entered its stage of reconstruction several years earlier, her mother had gotten rid of the Faceless and reworked the entirety of the Imperial Guard into what it should be, the personal protectors of the Emperor and Imperial Palace. Her mother had done great things for the Empire, and she was proud that she got to do the same as Prime Minister and work alongside Arthur in running the massive nation.

She of course was trained by her mother in the same fighting style as her teacher, a former Great General, so if she ever got into a fight she could easily get herself out of it even without a Teigu. Deep down though she hoped that someday she was able to inherit her mother's Teigu.

"Alright, Lucena, let's see what the Emperor has in store for you." she told herself as she climbed into a jeep and drove off away from the palace, which no longer possessed a protective wall around it and relied solely on a barrier Teigu.

 **\- Fortress Shisuikan -**

 **\- One Hour Later -**

Since the original had been obliterated by the Shikoutazer twenty one years prior, a new fortress had been constructed atop the ruins of the old one and was almost exactly like it, with the only difference being the implementation of defensive weapons that were up to date with the times.

Currently there were two armies stationed at the fortress, these two specifically being the most powerful and largest within the Imperial Military, and they were led individually by by the most powerful Generals aside from the Great General herself, of course. They were known famously throughout the Empire as the Frost Princess and Ice Phoenix for their work in subjugating a massive horde of Danger Beasts that threatened the capital a year before.

"Hey Selena, everything's good on your end right?"

"Of course, Lucena. I'm ready to help out in the North just as much as you."

"I'm just so excited I can hardly contain myself! This is gonna be so cool!" said Lucean ecstatically while she bounced up and down on the tips of her toes, her younger sister Selena rolling her eyes and laughing a little at her demeanor.

Lucena and Selena, both age 21, traversed one of the walls of the Shisuikan with smiles on their faces and their thoughts already ahead on the battles they both knew were going to come. They were being tasked by the Emperor to help quell the civil war currently raging in the Northern Territory that had been going on for ten years, the various factions participating in said war vying for control over the tribes.

So of course it was only right to send the armies led by the daughters of the two heroes who brought down the Shikoutazer and the corrupt Empire twenty years prior.

Lucena inherited her mother's looks almost exactly, being tall, slender and beautiful with silver eyes, long flowing light blue hair with two locks framing the sides of her face as well as one that covered the entirety of the left side of her face, a porcelain skin color and large bust. She dressed similar too, wearing a General's attire similar to the one her mother wore only instead of being all white it had a gold trim, a black stripe running down the center and it had no sleeves whatsoever.

To make up for the lack of sleeves she wore two black arm warmers that reached up to her bicep, and to finish off the look she wore white stockings that also had heels, a clip-on belt around her waist and atop her head she wore a cap exactly like the one her mother wore only instead of a black cross it possessed the symbol of her army, the North Star. And just like her mother, she possessed the iconic tattoo that marked a user of Demon's Extract right at the base of her neck just above her cleavage.

Selena on the other hand differed drastically from her sister, instead opting for black, silver and blue battle armor that possessed two large shoulder pauldrons, a horned crown, and a body portion that hugged her figure tightly and showed off her curves. She also wore leg guards with armored heels and arm guards that protected her forearms as well as opera-length gloves underneath.

Like her mother she also had long blue hair that reached the back of her kneecaps, but unlike her sisters, father and mother she had complete _heterochromia_ , possessing a green right eye and a red left eye.

"General Lucena!" called out one of the soldiers from the courtyard, both Lucena and Selena turning to look down at him. "You have a visitor!"

"I'll be right down!" she yelled back, Selena rolling her eyes again when her sister leaped off the wall instead of taking the stairs literally five feet away from them.

Lucena hit the concrete floor like a cat and jogged over to the main gate, the General getting smiles and waves from every soldier she passed by on the way there. Once she got there she was shocked to see Juno standing next to a keep with her arms crossed a small grin on her face.

"Hey Sis."

"Juno!" exclaimed Lucena happily as she hugged her sister, surprising her at how tightly she wrapped her arms around her.

"What brings you here? We were just about to head out for the Northern Territories."

"I came to tell you the Emperor wants to see you. He has something important to tell you." replied Juno when Selena joined them after taking the correct way down off the wall to reach their meeting spot.

"Oh? What does Arthur want now?" she asked out of intrigue, Juno shrugging.

"Beats me. I'm the Prime Minister and he still doesn't share things with me sometimes."

"Well, that will put us a little behind schedule…" murmured Lucena with a frown before she turned to Selena and regained her smile. "Could you go ahead and lead my army with yours in my absence? I'd really appreciate it."

Selena nod her head and Lucena gave her a little salute before hopping into the passenger sheet of Juno's hero and riding off from the fortress with her, Selena turning to look back to the interior of the Shisuikan and sighing.

" _Why do I always get stuck doing these type of things…_ "

The drive back to the Imperial Capital was less than pleasurable, the bumps in the road not helping with the fact that the jeep wasn't the most comfortable, so when they finally arrived at the Imperial Palace Lucena hopped out off the seat and stretched out her back until she hear a pop.

"Oh thank god. That feels so much better."

"Come on Lucena." said Juno as she walked up the steps toward the front entrance, her sister following close behind.

Selena of course had been here multiple times before, most of the time getting promotions in her position within the Imperial Military as well as mission assignments from the Emperor, but for some reason she could tell that something about this particular meeting would be different from the rest. She remained silent when they entered the white marble room directly before the throne room and stood next to Juno in front of the doors, the two sisters glancing at one another before they pushed them inward.

Almost instantly Lucena's eyes gravitated to the group of people standing at the foot of the throne, and even quicker then that she recognized all of them.

"Mom? Dad? Why are you guys here?" asked both Lucena and Juno at the same time, Esdeath, Tatsumi and Maya all turning around with Arthur to look at them.

Esdeath was in a cream colored dress with a frilled hemline and had her hair tied in a single ponytail, Tatsumi had on simply black trousers and his white jacket over a grey t-shirt, and Maya wore an outfit similar to the one she wore when she was younger, only instead of an obi around her waist she wore a belt that had two pieces of side skirt armor flanking either hip, and strung over her shoulders was a dark red cape connected to two decently sized shoulder pauldrons inscribed with a yellow tomoe on each.

All three of them had some slight wrinkles that showed their age, but all in all they looked almost practically the same as they did twenty one years prior

"You'll see here in a few." replied Esdeath with a grin, her response only serving to confuse her daughter and Juno even further.

"Thank you for doing that Juno. You can stay if you wish, which is something I highly recommend." said Arthur, Juno nodding her head before she walked around on the side until she stood next to her mother.

Arthur walked up to Lucena and towered over her , the young General quickly being reminded yet again at how tall he was when compared to any _normal_ person, but he quickly kneeled down and sat just a few inches below eye level for her and observed for a few moments.

"My, you have grown over these years. I remember seeing you when you were just a baby, and now look at you. You've made yourself a name throughout the Empire and became my top General. Flawless track record, exceptional leader skills as well as being the user of the ame powerful Teigu your mother uses."

"Um, thank you." said Lucena before he stood back up and took a couple steps away from her while motioning to Maya to come to his side.

"Which is why I've talked with Maya and we both came to the same conclusion concerns these undeniable facts. Great General, if you could?"

Maya took Arthur's spot and crossed her arms across her chest, clearing her throat afterwards and saying, "Lucena, it is with great pleasure that I hereby resign from the position of Great General and give it to you."

"C-Could you say that again?" asked Lucena while blinking, Maya chuckling.

"I'm retiring Selena, and I'm choosing you to be my successor as Great General of the Empire." repeated Maya, Lucena's eyes widening when the realization finally hit her.

She was totally floored by the fact that she was going to become the next Great General, the commander-in-chief of all of the Empire's military forces directly underneath the Emperor himself. Lucena looked past Maya over at her parents and Esdeath and Tatsumi both gave her smiles brimming with pride at joy at their daughter's achievement, which only fueled the well of emotions building up inside of her.

"Congratulations, _Great_ General. You've earned this." said Arthur once Maya stepped away from Lucena and returned to daughter's side.

"T-Thank you, Arthur, I mean your Highness." replied Lucena with a slight stutter as Esdeath and Tatsumi walked up to her.

"That's not all, Lucena. We have something to give to you as well."

Lucena moved her focus to the arm Tatsumi had behind his back and when he brought it out into view, he gasped when she saw the original key for Tyrannus in his grasp. She looked back up at him and he nod his head while he held the sword out towards her, Esdeath watching with a smile on her face when she took the sword from her father.

"It's yours now, think of it as an early birthday present." he said to explain the giving of Tyrannus to her, Lucena holding the sword up to her eyes and admiring its craftsmanship before she felt a presence appear inside of her head upon touching the cold metal.

" _ **So you're the runt's daughter. The name is Tyrant, it's a pleasure to meet you.**_ "

" _Whoa! You're the Danger Beast dad told me about?!_ " sputtered Lucena in her mind at the dragon's entrance into her psyche.

" _ **Yeah, and here's a little tidbit of information. If you want to change the appearance of the key, all you have to do is ask and I'll do it for you.**_ "

Tatsumi and Esdeath watched when Lucena tossed the sword to her dominate hand and closed her eyes, the emblem of Tyrant's eye built into the structure of the sword giving off a faint glow before the whole sword turned into a formless object of matter made of bright red light. Quickly the blade itself grew a couple of feet longer and drastically narrowed, and just from this change alone Esdeath knew exactly what Selena was transforming the sword into.

"Ah, much better." she said when the light faded and she held up the newly made key for Tyrannus, which now took on the form of a rapier with a hand guard and dark grey blade.

She remembered that her parents were still in front of her and with a smile she gave both Tatsumi and Esdeath a hug while thanking them for the gift.

After saying their goodbyes to Arthur and Juno, Maya took Tatsumi, Esdeath took their daughter to the Imperial Training Grounds to show Lucena where the office of the Great General was as well as to give her an ample space for her to don Tyrannus for the first time.

"Well, I'm sure you guys can handle it from here right?" asked Maya with a glance at Tatsumi and Esdeath while Lucena walked out to the center of the large training field.

"Yeah, thanks for taking us here. We'll see you back at home."

Maya waved goodbye as she left them with Lucena, the two returning their attention to their daughter when she turned to face them with the key in her gasp and a look of confusion on her face.

"Uh, what do I do again?" she asked with a cheesy grin, Tatsumi rolling his eyes as he walked over to her and pointed at her feet.

"To claim Tyrannus as your own, you must shout the Teigu's name with ever fiber of your being and stab the key into the dirt before you. You have to put meaning behind it in order to effectively don the Teigu, believe me when I say this, Tyrant is picky when it comes to the users of the armor."

Lucena nod her head and when he stepped back she took a deep breath and gripped the handle of Tyrannus tighter then ever before, her will and passion igniting a fire inside of her that grew more powerful with each passing second. Finally she called out the name of the Teigu and stabbed the rapier's blade into the dirt, a enormous ring of Fire coming to lift that initiated the summoning of Tyrant's visage behind her. The Danger Beast roared just as the armor of Tyrannus began to cover Lucena's body, its design and structure the same as when it was last used by Esdeath so many years prior. The ice it grew upon being fused with Demon's Extract took shape and when the fire died down, Lucena opened her eyes and looked down at her clawed hands as she opened and closed them when they started to tingle.

" _There's so much…it's unbelievable..._ " she thought, the difference between the power and its aura from Demon's Extract and Tyrannus astounding her.

Her Teigu always gave off a slightly dark, ominous and vile feeling that could send shivers running up and down the spine of any who came to know it, but with Tyrannus...it felt like she had just become a Danger Beast filled with such raw and uncontrollable strength that could overmatch any foe it was encountered with.

" _ **You okay girl? Is everything in working order?**_ " asked Tyrant of Lucena.

" _Yeah, I'm fine. I was just caught off guard by how much power I got after donning Tyrannus._ "

" _ **Well allow me to go ahead and say this. Since Esdeath fused Demon's Extract and my flesh, the two Teigu can now automatically fuse with one another if used by a person who possesses both Teigu, so the reason why you felt such an influx of power was from my flesh and Demon's Extract performing this automatic fusion.**_ "

" _I see...thanks for telling me that._ "

" _I do believe we should be heading out now. It's going to be a long trek to the North, so we might as well start now._ " spoke up Alzora after Tyrant had finished.

Lucena had almost forgotten that the female Danger Beast had moved her conscious over from Esdeath to her, and even now she was still unsure as to how exactly such a thing had been accomplished. She disregarded the thought however and was just glad to now have two voices of knowledge that could consult her in the midst of a battle.

With her talk now over she deactivated Tyrannus and looked back at her parents, who came over to her and congratulated her one final time before they let her go off on the back of an ice horse to return to her sister at the Shisuikan. When she vanished out of sight, Tatsumi wrapped an arm around Esdeath's shoulders and pulled her close to his side to kiss her on the forehead and take the scent of her hair.

"They grow up so fast…I still think back to when she was first born every time I see her." he said with a sigh, Esdeath slowly nodding her head and smiling.

"Me too. I do the same thing with Selena too." she replied before her mile wavered a little.

Tatsumi caught the movement and rubbed her arm to reassure her while shifting his weight onto the other foot, "Don't worry. They'll be fine, we taught them well. They can both handle themselves."

"I know, but still...I can't help but worry." Esdeath brought up a hand to her tattoo and gently ran her finger across the mark. "I'm still not quite used to these new feelings of mine…"

"Esdeath, we both know that Lucena and Selena are strong. Hell, Selena even got one of the Next Generation Teigu that Arthur and the other scientists created, and Lucena...I think she might even be stronger then you when it comes to Demon's Extract, and now that she has Tyrannus too there's no contest whatsoever."

"Okay, I guess you're right. But I'm not so sure about that part with her being stronger then me. I may be older, but I can still lay waste to entire army." joked Esdeath with a grin, Tatsumi rolling his eyes at her before they started to walk.

"You know, I heard that Akame and Wave are coming here. Maybe we can find Lubbock and Leone and have a little reunion.

 **\- Two Hours Later -**

 **\- Tatsumi and Esdeath's House -**

"Okay, this better be good. I've got a lot of work ahead of me."

Lubbock yelped when Leone threw an arm around his throat and put him in a choke hold while she grinned, the lioness laughing when he squirmed and tried to break free.

"Of course you don't really mean that, right Lubbock?" she asked, the former assassin turned General quickly nodding his head so that she could let him go.

"Even after all these years you two still haven't changed." said Tatsumi with a laugh after he, Esdeath and Maya met their two friends in the entry hall of their mansion home.

Lubbock had changed somewhat over the years in appearance, the green haired General now in command of his own army and as such he wore a formal General''s attire that he made some adjustments too. It had an abundance of pouches hanging from the belt within which he stored spools of thread for Cross Tail, and then over top he wore a similar coat to the one he wore as an assassin, with the only difference being it was a dark green and the fur collar was a gray color instead of white. He had also grown out a green goatee that made him look older then he really was, and spanning one of his cheeks was a large scar that he received while subjugating hostile Danger Beasts.

Leone on the other hand was still just as bodacious and optimistic as ever, and since she was a member of the Imperial Police she maintained her physical prowess since she constantly worked out day in and day out. And of course, rather then wear the new standard uniform of the police properly she instead wore the cap lopsided on top of her head and had all of the buttons for the shirt undone so that it hung open from her shoulders, revealing the black bikini top she wore to cover up her large breasts, and wore a pair of short, black, skin-tight pants that only came about halfway down her thighs. Covering her feet were steel-toed boots that reached up to her calves, and hanging around her waist was of course Lionel.

"It's good to see you guys again. And I heard that you stepped down from your position as Great General Maya. Who'd you have take your spot?" asked Lubbock while he shook hands with Tatsumi, Maya crossing her arms and smiling.

"I gave it to Lucena. She earned it."

"Nice." said Leone as she placed a hand on her hip and looked around at the mansion once again, since she hadn't been here in a long time. "So when are the others going to get here?"

Her question was answered when the front door opened up and in walked Wave and Akame, the husband and wife smiling warmly at the sight of their friends as soon as they entered the mansion. Wave wore a navy blue jacket similar to the one he wore when he was younger, his hair was a little longer, and true to his nature as a man of the sea he had a sizeable beard from his time away from land.

Akame, in the years since they had last seen her, had hardly changed her attire but had most definitely moved on beyond her tragic past as an assassin to the empire and had become more lively. Being with Wave and leaving behind her home had also done good for her as well, and over time the two of them got so used to traveling that they became ambassadors to their friends Solomon and Camilla in the Kingdom of Straelka. Still, even though they were no longer fighting anyone, Wave still carried Grand Chariot in the same manner Tatsumi had done when Tyrant had fused Tyrannus to him, and Akame had Yatsufusa close at hand.

"Hey guys, long time no see." said Lubbock.

"Hello. It has been a long time, hasn't it?" replied Wave with a laugh as he closed the door behind himself and Akame.

"How's Hikari doing? Where is she now?" asked Maya when she gave him a hug.

"She's heading to the North to help stop the Civil War." said Akame as she followed everyone into the nearby living room so that they could all sit down and continue their conversation while relaxing.

"Well, that's the primary reason. I have a sneaky suspicion there's another reason why as well…"

Wave glanced over at Tatsumi and Esdeath and they both rolled their eyes while Leone and Lubbock snickered under their breath and Maya sighed.

"We can talk about that later. For now, let's just enjoy the time we have right now to catch up."

"Agreed."

 **\- Imperial Vault -**

Arthur thanked the two Imperial Guards for opening the vault door for him before stepping inside to the lit circular chamber after so long, marvelling at how even after a thousand years it practically looked the same when he had first had it constructed upon the Empire's founding. He strolled through the isles of pedestals covered with unused Teigu and came to stop at a guitar, being sure to close his eyes and offer a moment of silence to the man who had wielded the Teigu before moving on. He looked to his left and chuckled when he spotted the hidden door in the wall where he alongside Dreivas and the other Teigu comprising the Six Armors Series had been kept, remembering the time he had encountered Maya for the first time there.

" _Good times..._ " he thought to himself, his eyes moving away from the opening and coming to rest on the most recent addition to the vault that had been built twenty one years earlier at the behest of Tatsumi, Esdeath, and practically everyone else.

He produced a key from his pocket and inserted it into the lock for the heavy iron doors, turning it one to unlock them so that he could slowly pull on open in order to step inside the sealed off room. Built into the wall directly across the entrance was a heavily reinforced cage made of the strongest material they could get their hands on, complete with chains, locks and a secondary reinforced glass cage built directly behind the the first, and resting inside was none other then Devil's Heart. Arthur approached the cage and stared at the heart with a heavy scowl, the dark and vile aura it gave off washing over him and causing him to cringe slightly at the evil Teigu that had caused the pain and suffering of so many.

"You will never have a user ever again, you foul thing." he said in a low tone before he ensured that the measures put in place to keep the heart in place had not been tampered with, a habit he had made for himself ever since he took on the position of Emperor once again.

Finally he left the room and sealed up the doors, the darkness consuming the small enclosure once they were closed. A few minutes after his departure from the secondary vault, a steady beat began to emit from within the holding chamber. The heart was very much still alive, waiting patiently for the day when its next user would come for it just like Jacqueline had many years before.

" _I'll come back...I will always...come back...all I must do...is wait. Human...with blood of Beast and Man...come to me...we have work to do..._ "

 **\- End of Part 1 -**


	50. Freak Occurrence

A/N WELCOME my people to PART 2 of this story, let us all start this off on a good note! I hope that as more of this part of the story is developed that you guys will love it just as much the first portion. The characters I have planned to be introduced should be good, and I also have a lot of good plot stuff to introduce, so just you wait guys.

Also, I probably should have said this in the A/N for the last chapter, I have the pages for **Lucena** , **Selena** and **Juno** up on the wiki, so you guys should go check them out and see their appearances. Personally, I like Lucena among all the rest. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **A Different Path**

 **\- Part 2: Ancient Resurgence -**

* * *

 **Chapter 49 - Freak Occurrence**

" _You...you have all fallen into the darkness of ignorance...You accursed beings...I will exterminate you all..._ "

 **\- Northern Territory, Cycladic Glacier Shelf -**

"Move forward! Their defensive line is about to break!"

"I'll cover you! Massen Hagelsprung!"

Lucena hurled her arm down and flung five gigantic columns of ice down towards the ring of defensive emplacements surrounding an expansive fortress built atop of a frozen tundra consisting of several large glaciers known collectively as the Cycladic Glacier Shelf. Currently they were at the last stronghold in control of one of the big factions vying for control over the Northern territory and its tribes, one who was led by those who favored a political system that could not and should not stand in order too protect the people. So to bring peace back to the troubled lands, the Empire had stepped in and joined the side led by a prominent clan named the Frost Dragons, who preached justice and peace for the people.

Lucena smirked when her overwhelming attack completely annihilated the first line of defense for their enemies, and to add only insult to injury she spotted Selena leap ahead of their soldiers and allies with a pair of phoenix wings blazing with blue fire hovering inches away from her back.

" _Unyielding God: Gungnir...Arthur your certainly outdid yourself on creating it as well as the other two new Teigu._ " thought Lucena as she soared back to the frozen ground and cloaked herself in Tyrannus, her wings of ice becoming blades that she cut through the enemy soldiers like paper.

"Helios Rise!" bellowed Selena before grasping her spear with two hands and sweeping it to the side, creating a massive wave of blue fire that washed over a crowd of enemy defends, seemingly killing them by reducing them to ash.

However, the flames produced by Gungnir were special in that instead of burning and scorching anything unfortunate enough to be caught by them, it freezes them on the spot in extraordinarily cold ice. It was a fitting tool for the one named "Ice Phoenix", and she was already reputed as a strong Teigu user even though she had yet to utilize the Teigu's Trump Card.

"Great General! They just unveiled a fresh batch of reinforcements from previously unknown holding areas built into the glacier! We're being surrounded!" shouted a soldier close by to Lucena, her head whipping back and her eyes widening when she saw the large force of soldiers pushing up on her and Selena's army from the rear.

"I'll handle them. Captain, maintain focus on pushing to take the fortress!" she ordered before she spread out her ice wings and barrel towards the enemy force, the tattoo on her chest beginning to glow when she tapped into Demon's Extract.

She came to a screeching halt several meters before the first few men rushing toward her and laughed as she thrust her arm up to the sky, index finger pointed straight out, and focused all of her energy into the tiniest focal point possible at the tip of her finger.

"Arctic World!"

A bright blue light flashed from her finger before a huge crystal of ice manifested mere inches above it and launched up high into the sky, the oncoming enemy force hesitating in their charge to watch it rise higher and higher. All of a sudden the crystal began to rapidly expand and form curves, slowly transforming into a literal planetoid of ice many times larger then even the largest column of ice formed by Lucena's Hagelsprung. It was so large in cast a shadow across the entire glacier shelf, plunging it into darkness when the planet of Ice blocked out the morning sun, and with looks of horror painted on their faces they stared at Lucena as she unfurled the rest of the fingers on her extended hand and flung it back towards the ground.

The ice planetoid began to move at breakneck speed, its immense size pushing away the clouds in the sky on its collision course with the glacier. Lucena gave a little salute to the men standing in front of her before she quickly left the area to return to her men and inform them to brace themselves for what was coming. A few moments later the entire glacier ice shelf rumbled and shook like the end of the world had just commenced when the huge ball of ice struck its mark and utterly devastated the surrounding area.

"You just had to use _that_ technique, didn't you?" asked Selena of her sister with a frown on her face, Lucena giving her a carefree grin and a light chuckle.

"I had to use it at least once." she replied.

Selena rolled her eyes and let out a sigh before the two sisters continued their assault of the fortress, the number of enemies opposing them diminishing faster and faster until were able to penetrate the fortress itself and make their way towards the nerve center of the entire operation in the throne room.

However the sisters were both surprised that upon bursting in through the throne room doors they discovered that the ruthless leaders of the enemy factions had already been dispatched off, and standing in the middle of the room with a familia sword at her side was the culprit herself.

"Would've been nice if you had done that sooner, Hikari." remarked Lucena with a grin as she deactivated Tyrannus and slid the key into its sheath, Selena doing the same with Gungnir and dissipating the flaming phoenix wings as they watched the young woman with the sword turn towards them and give them both a warm smile.

"Hey Selena, Lucena. It's good to see you guys again." said Hikari, the daughter of Wave and Akame, before putting Murasame back in its sheath and striding over to them.

Hikari was a young woman, a year younger then they were, with all black hair save for the bang hanging down over the middle of his face being navy blue that she tied into a ponytail with a blue ribbon that reached down to her thighs. She also had hair antennae, two side-locks that reached her chest and a bust that was second only to Lucena's. She was quite slender with somewhat thin limbs and a flat abdomen, and from her father she inherited his striking blue eyes and caring smile. However her manner of dress she got from her mother, she wore a white, black and red school-type uniform with thigh-high stockings, black shoes with a red outline, and around her neck she wore the very same scarf with the anchor patch on it that Wave wore when he was younger.

She hugged both Lucena and Selena before they walked out of the throne room, their mission at the fortress and Cycladic Glacier Shelf now completed. The Civil War that had consumed the Northern Territory had finally been brought to an end, and when the three returned with their allies to the largest city within the territory, Glacias, they were treated as honored guests and heroes.

When they were finally able to escape from the crowds to the camps their armies had constructed just outside the city, the three were able to breath easy and unwind their limbs and nerves.

"Oh thank god...I can finally hear myself think…" muttered Lucena after plopping herself down into a chair within their shared command tent, both Selena and Hikari nodding in agreement.

"When do we head back to the capital again?" asked Hikari while Selena began to remove her armor and Lucena tossed her cap onto a nearby cot.

"Probably in the next couple of days, since we have to stay and ensure that the new government being formed to unite the tribes under one flag doesn't encounter any problems." replied Selena as she set aside her shoulder pauldrons and started to strip off the other portions. "So while we're waiting, we might as well enjoy ourselves and relax."

Selena finished taking off her armor and the basic clothing she wore underneath before briefly crossing the interior of the tent without any clothes on to the other side, bending down so that she could reach under her cot for the spare clothing she kept beneath it.

Lucena couldn't help but smirk and said with a snicker, "Nice ass and tits Sis."

She glanced back at her with a blank expression before she slipped on a pair of grey panties and pulled a light blue t-shirt over her head to cover her breasts. Then she plopped down onto the cot and made a motion with her hand to shoo her and Hikari out of the tent while letting out a yawn.

"I'm going to sleep, you two do whatever you want. Just not here…" she said before rolling over onto her side and drifting off into a deep sleep.

Lucena glanced at Hikari and she shrugged as she got up from her chair and left the tent with her to pursue another method of relaxation if they wouldn't be able to there. To pass the time and to think of a way Lucena and her walked throughout the large camp, greeting the soldiers serving under her and Selena and thanking them for helping them.

When they left a grouping of men sharing laughs and stories with one another an idea immediately popped into Hikari's mind and she grabbed Lucena's hand while smiling from cheek to cheek, "I know what we can do! I heard that there's a really nice bathhouse in the city that uses mineral water. What do you think?"

"That sounds wonderful! Let's go!" said Lucena before she grabbed Hikari and without warning leaped into the air so as to form a horse of ice underneath her legs that she used to ride up towards the city.

It only took them a few minutes to reach the foretold bathhouse and they were admitted almost instantly, being led by one of the staff members there to a bath separated from the rest. Hikari shut the door of the entrance room that also acted as the changing room and locked it, turning back and immediately blushing heavily at the sight of Lucena removing her uniform and revealing her white bra that seemed to just barely contain her breasts.

Hikari quickly turned away to start removing her own clothes when Lucena looked over at her, and she giggled because of the reaction "You know you don't have to avert your gaze like that any more. One because we're both girls, and two, you do remember the promise that we made, right?"

"Yeah, I know." replied Hikari with a sigh after she unclipped her skirt and threw it into a container bin alongside the ribbon for her hair. "But still, I can't help myself…"

Lucena smiled when she removed her shirt and unclipped the straps around her wrists that contained the hidden blades she kept underneath the sleeves, her status as an assassin showing itself again. Lucena then took off her heeled stockings and slipped off her panties, putting them both into a basket for her stuff before reaching around her back to unclip her bra strap.

She let out a sigh of relief when her breasts were freed from the confines of the bra and stretched her back a little, Hikari's eyes unconsciously gravitating to them just like Lucena had expected.

"Well, let me remind you of that promise."

Lucena, who was now utterly nude, then turned to face Hikari and she leaned forward a little to grab onto one of her free hands with her own and bring it back towards her. Hikari's cheeks turned a bright shade of red when Lucena placed her hand gently on her left breast, the steady beat of her heart resonating through the soft mound of flesh and through her fingertips.

"I promised you that my body and my heart would belong only to you…"

"And mine yours." finished Hikari with a smile, Lucena laughing before she let go of her hand and walked out through a second door into the steaming pool just outside the changing room.

Hikari finished undressing and joined Lucena in the water, which was at such the perfect temperature that as soon as she submerged herself up to base of her neck she felt all of her stress just melt away.

"Definitely a good idea to come here...this warmth is so much better then the cold outside…" she said, Lucena slowly nodding her head in agreement.

They sat there next to one another in silence for a minute before Hikari leaned her head to the right and rested it on Lucena's shoulder, the Great General glancing down at her and the expression of happiness on her face. She kissed her on the forehead and when Hikari took the bait by lifting up her head, she moved in and planted a passionate kiss on the lips that caused a flame to spontaneously ignite within her heart.

Instead of letting her move away she put a hand on Lucena's cheek and kept her in place so that she could return the kiss and keep it alive for a few more moments, only drawing apart afterwards when each had often their fill. Hikari then lowered her gaze and dropped her head down while Lucena leaned her back up against the edge of the pool, her breasts rising up out of the water.

"You're so cute...like a baby…" said Lucena when Hikari took one of her breasts in hand and began to suck on the nipple, gently swirling her tongue over the nub.

Lucena whimpered a little in pleasure, but with a mischievous grin she maneuvered her hand between Hikari's thighs and rubbed the folds of her sex with her index and middle finger a few times. Hikari gasped a little when she felt Lucena's fingers slip past her entrance and start to massage her inner walls sensually, the assassin retaliating by switching to Lucena's other breast and biting softly on the nipple with her teeth.

"H-Hey, ease up there…" she murmured with a stutter, Hikari glancing up at her and grinning slightly before she bit the nipple again while she flicked it with her tongue. "S-Stop that, those are s-sensitive…ah!"

Meanwhile, back at camp, Selena was deep within the recesses of her mind, enjoying a pleasant dream of hers before all of a sudden she was awoken with a start by a deafening roar. She instantly knew what kind of creature could make such a spine-tingling shriek and flew into action, grabbing Gungnir and disregarding the fact she still only wore a t-shirt and panties she sprinted out of the tent.

Blue flames consumed her entire body and she flew up into the air cloaked in a sleeveless black robe with flames wrapping around the hemline, her phoenix wings taking her across the camp to the side facing away from the city where she saw a displeasing sight, to say the least. An immense horde of Danger Beasts of all sizes were coming straight for them, and she was glad to see her men as well as Lucena's were already engaging them to try and thin out their numbers until she arrived.

"Thanks for holding them off! I'll take it from here!" she announced upon hitting the snow covered dirt before their line, her grip around Gungnir tightening as she raised the spear high above her head. "Arctic Fall!"

Selena stabbed Gungnir's tip into the ground and several massive pillars of fire erupted to life around her in a semi-circle, the blue fire immediately freezing a split second later into solid columns of ice that she then cut down at the base and sent them toppling over down onto the rampaging Danger Beasts. The ones caught underneath the immense weight of the ice were crushed instantly, but still they kept coming like the mindless creatures they were regardless of the brutal death of their brethren.

The soldiers behind Selena continued to fire at them with their rifles, being extra sure to not hit their General as she flew into the fray with Gungnir, cutting them down left and right. All of a sudden all of the Danger Beasts suddenly gained a mind of their own and began to move like an actual army of humans, retreating away from her upon recognizing her as a dangerous target. They changed positions and began to encircle her, the weaker ones proceeding to assault the camp's defenses while the larger and more strong Danger Beasts remained to fight Selena with tooth and claw.

" _What is going on here?! These things can't possibly have enough intelligence to organize themselves_!" she thought in total bafflement when she cleaved a wolf-like Danger Beast in half after it had lunged at her.

The deafening roar she heard earlier echoed out from beyond some snowy hills set away from the camp by at least a hundred meters, and Selena growled when a Danger Beast larger then any of the ones currently surrounding her emerged from behind them and glared at her with not one pair of eyes, but _three_.

The Danger Beast's three heads sat atop three long necks heavily armored with thick scales that connected with its body just above the shoulders. Protecting its chest and arms were thick scales and a layer of ice that formed spiked armor, and extending out from all four of its feet were razor-sharp claws that were also tipped in ice. Each head also possessed a large amount of ice that created a set of four horns for each just above the eyes, the ice then conjoining together into a shell that completely covered its back like a turtle, a long spiked tail protruding out from its backside completing its unorthodox appearance.

Selena was totally awestruck by the drastic difference in appearance between the Danger Beasts she's seen and whatever being this thing was, but she didn't have long to try and discover its origins when it reared back on its hind legs and smashed its front feet into the ground before charging right at her.

She took to the skies to avoid being rammed by the Danger Beast's three heads, but was caught off guard when the center head followed her up and unleashed a torrential spray of ice that looked like slush. Selena met the Danger Beast's attack by creating a stream of her own freezing fire, but to her shock the creature's ice began to trump her's in strength and overwhelm it, forcing her to quickly fly away to revise her strategy.

That's when she remembered her allies on the ground, and with a split-second decision she moved her focus away from the giant hydra-like Danger Beast and reared back with Gungnir, the spear tip becoming engulfed in blue fire as she took aim.

"Ignis Weiser!" she bellowed, her aim staying true when she lobbed Gungnir down towards the ground right into the center of the Danger Beast horde.

The spear, as soon as it hit the dirt and snow, unleashed a dome of ice fire that consumed every single Danger Beast around it and froze them all in blocks of ice. With the threat to her men and Lucena's men now gone, she swooped down to retrieve her Teigu before returning her attention to the hydra creature she could only assume was a Super-class due to its size and strength.

" _What kind of Danger Beast is this thing? Spitting ice out like it was fire?! I've never even heard of that!_ "

"Grauhorn!"

In the midst of her thinking she had been totally oblivious to her surroundings and whipped her head around to see that Lucena and Hikari had returned to the camp, and with a grin on her face the Great General warded off the hydra-like Danger Beast by ramming a horn of ice into the crest covering its chest and knocked it back a few meters.

"We got here as fast as we could after we heard those roars! Give me a rundown of what's happened!" yelled Lucena up to her sister, Selena flying down towards her and touching down softly on her bare feet next to her and Hikari with a frown on her face.

"While you two were gone a massive horde of Danger Beasts suddenly attacked us, and while at first they were acting like the normal mindless creatures they are, they suddenly organized themselves and actually split themselves up in order to try and deal with me and our soldiers at the same time."

"Like an actual army?" questioned Hikari.

Selena nod her head once before she pointed with her finger at the Super-class Danger Beast, which by now had recovered from the blow Lucena had dealt to it and was now glaring at them menacingly. "Then that thing appeared. I've never seen something like this before, and what's even stranger is that instead of breathing fire it actually breathes out ice."

"That _is_ strange." replied Lucena with a concerned tone before she manifested her own pair of wings out of ice and grinned, the key for Tyrannus already in the palm of her hand. "But it won't matter now that we're here. Let's go Selena, Hikari!"

"Right!"

 **\- Corinth, Capital of Tessa, Western Nations -**

"Report!"

"Hostile Danger Beasts are surrounding us from all sides! There numbers are thinning, but they also seem be organizing themselves to counter this change!"

"Hmm...interesting…"

Corinth was in the midst of a siege by a horde of Danger Beasts, and the person in charge of its defense was standing atop the wall built to protect it with his arms behind his back, his second-in-command at his side. The man was dressed in nearly all black save for the thick fire-resistant wool-like undershirt he wore, with a black jacket, black gloves and black boots, as well as a black kama kept around his waist with a brown belt. Over his shoulders rested a black cloak held together with a clip reminiscent of ball of flame located just above the right shoulder, and covering the entirety of his head and face was a black helmet that possessed two red-stained eyeholes that allowed the man to see.

"And that thing, do we have any information on it?" asked the man while motioning with a head nod to the giant mole-like Danger Beast present behind the horde directly in front of him.

The creature had six legs, each tipped with four claws, and protruding from its "face" were two drill-like tusks that hid its real mouth behind their large size. Dead tree branches and blue moss covered its body, mainly on top of its back, and located within this jumbled mess of plants was a large purple bulb that pulsated with every movement the Danger BEast made, implying that something was definitely inside of it.

"None sir, we've never encountered something like this." replied the man's second-in-command.

"Very well. I'll deal with these threats at once."

The man with the helmet suddenly leaped from the wall while simultaneously unwrapping the golden chain that was coiled up and hanging from a clip on his belt, the fairly large dagger built into the chain's tip glinting in the sun as he flew right for the center of the mass of Danger Beats threatening the city.

"Heavenly Impact!" he bellowed as he threw the blade tip down into the crowd, the dagger digging into the dirt enough so that he could pull himself down at rapid speed while also extending his right foot out.

Golden flames came to life around the base of his foot a split second before he hit the ground, an explosion of fire shooting outward in all directions that incinerated any Danger Beasts caught in the blast radius while the shockwave pushed back all the rest. He recoiled the chain back into his right hand just when the first Danger Beast to recover lunged at him, the man swinging around and wrapping the chain around its neck before tugging it hard, breaking the creature's neck instantly and freeing him to attack the next opponent.

"Capoeira Inferno!" he called out as he let more of the chain's length free from his grasp, the portion he wasn't touching igniting itself with the same golden fire from before.

He switched from twisting around on his feet and to his hands, the movements similar to a strange dance with elements of acrobatics in it, and grinned under his helmet as the flaming chain ripped through any Danger Beast brave enough to venture close with ease. He suddenly stopped and leaped into the air off of his right hand, lunging out with his right hand to throw the chain like a rope-dart and stab the blade end directly into the forehead of a nearby lizard Danger Beast.

He pulled himself to it and began another slaughter of the creatures, performing the same devastating techniques with the golden fire until all that remained was the unknown Super-class waiting for him at the crest of a nearby hill.

" _Let's see what you're made of!_ " thought the man as he wrapped up the chain and began to stroll calmly towards it, each step he took burning the grass at his feet because of the golden fire being secreted from the soles of his boots.

The beast let out a low toned growl the closer the man got, the fires raging around becoming more intense with each step until finally the Danger Beast crouched down and shrieked. The bulb atop its back suddenly burst similar to how a flower would bloom, a massive cloud of dark purple pollin exploding out in a mushroom-cloud fashion before washing over the landscape and consuming the man within it.

" _Even if this is some kind of toxin, my helmet and mask protects me from this easily._ " he thought as he leaped out of the cloud to spot where the Danger Beast was, but to his surprise her only found a hole where it once was.

"Bah, it must've burrowed itself away. At least the threat to the city is gonna, however." he said with slight irritation before returning the chain to his belt and sighing. "I'll need to report this to Mom and Dad."

 **\- Glacies, Northern Territory -**

Lucena growled when the hydra-like Danger Beast used one of its heads to bash through the ice wall she had created, the creature roaring from all three as it blew out three streams of ice at her. She avoided them easily and dove right for its left shoulder at the same time as Selena prepared to used Gungnir on the wound they had inflicted to its left leg earlier with Hikari since they could now touch its flesh through its armor.

The beast was about to retaliate against the two sisters and assassin before a presence entered its mind and gave it an order it could not disobey. " _Skessa, retreat._ "

The Danger Beast suddenly reared back on its hind legs and smashed its front feet on the ground again, very nearly crushing Selena and Hikari, and then used its tail to bash aside Lucena before she could get close. The beast growled and snarled as if it were pain for a few moments before the ice shell on its back shattered, revealing two wings that unfolded out and began to flap vigorously in order to lift the creature off the ground.

Then, to ensure it wasn't followed, it sprayed on a layer of ice over top its fallen opponents to trap them beneath it temporarily while it made its hasty escape from the area. When it vanished out of sight into an approaching snowstorm, Lucena broke her way out of the ice sheet with brute strength and helped Selena and Hikari out, the three scanning the surrounding landscape for any sign of their opponent before looking at each other in confusion.

"What was that all about? First it attacks us and then it retreats?" questioned Hikari, Lucena and Selena shrugging their shoulders.

"I have no idea, but what I do know is that we need to head back to the Imperial Capital as soon as possible." replied Selena, a nod of agreement coming from Lucena as she crossed her arms and frowned.

"Considering what just happened, I have a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach that tells me this wasn't just some random freak occurrence."


	51. Sparring Session

A/N Alright, way to kick it off on an ominous note. High-five me. But yes, moving on, I have done all of you the pleasure of putting up the page for Selena's Teigu, **Gungnir** , as well as the page for Wave and Akame's daughter **Hikari**. Speaking of that, due to how well the previous same-sex relationship held between good ole Jacqy and Kahfka in the previous part, I decided to go on and do the same for this one with Lucena and Hikari. Hope you guys are okay with that. Gotta have some flair when it comes to this stuff, y'know. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 50 - Sparring Session**

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

 **\- Five Days Later -**

Lucena, Selena and Hikari hopped off the ice horses the former had constructed for them when they arrived at the Imperial Training Grounds, the two Generals taking a few minutes to bid farewell to to their armies and dismiss them for the time being. Once they were taken care of, the three began the journey to the Imperial Palace so that they could inform Arthur of what had occurred back in the Northern Territory with the unique Danger Beast.

"I'm always put at ease when I see everyone smiling and enjoying their lives here in the capital." said Hikari with a smile as they strolled through the streets, Lucena nodding her head.

"Definitely. Our parents told us stories of how the people he were always afraid and solemn when Prime Minister Honest was in power."

"Don't forget the public executions." added Selena with a slight shiver. "I can't begin to imagine how horrifying it must've been to have those be a daily occurrence."

Hikari agreed and they dropped the mortifying topic when they came to the Imperial Palace, but no sooner did they arrive there did they hear the revving of an engine and they turned around to see a keep driving towards them.

"Well I'll be damned." said Lucena with a grin as she crossed her arms when the keep came to a halt, the young man in the passenger seat hopping out onto the concrete road.

The man was just slightly taller then Lucena and had messy, neck-length white hair with streaks of pinkish red in it, a prominent stubble along his jaw line, and red eyes with slit pupils. He wore an outfit consisting of a black beanie with a single purple stripe on it, a zip-up purple, grey and black shirt with four entrails and a short sleeve on the right arm and a long sleeve for the left, baggy black pants held up with a dark grey sash tied around his waist, and sandals. Sticking out from between his lips was an already lit cigarette, and when he smiled at them they could see all off his teeth had been filed down to a razor-sharp point like a shark's.

"Nice to see you guys again." he said with a chuckle before giving them a salute and a wink. "Hikari, Selena, Bomb Tits."

Lucena's left eye twitched at the unwanted nickname she received from him and raised a hand up, the man gulping as an icicle sharpened to a tip manifested underneath his jaw mere inches from his throat.

"What did I say about calling me that? Morgan?" she asked lightly with malicious intent lacing every syllable, the man nervously laughing while rubbing the back of his neck.

"Hehe, sorry Lucena. Couldn't resist myself."

"Bomb Tits…that's great…" said Selena under her breath as she kept herself from laughing, Lucena glaring at her with the same look she gave Morgan.

"Why'd you come all the way here from Straelka? And are Solomon and Camilla here?" asked Hikari while looking around for any sign of Morgan's parents.

"Mom and Dad were a little busy, and they couldn't waste time with sending a message the old fashioned way, so I volunteered to come here in half the time.

"And you managed that how?"

Morgan smirked as he reached into the keep next to him and pulled out a familiar looking shield from next to his seat, Lucena's eyes brightening up when a pair of pure white wings sprouted out from the Prince's back upon slipping the shield's straps over his right arm.

"With this, of course."

"You got it?!" stammered Lucena in awe of the Teigu wielded only by members of the Royal Family of Straelka.

"Of course."

"And we can assume you were taught how to use it?" asked Selena with a slight grin after Morgan deactivated Claíomh Solais and set the shield down on the ground next to him when the jeep drove away.

He only looked at her with a frown and she laughed, the Prince rolling his eyes and turning his attention back to Lucena while crossing his arms. "So why are you guys here? Didn't you guys just stop that Civil War in the North?"

"Yeah, but something...pretty unusual happened."

"How unusual?"

"We were attacked by a large horde of Danger Beasts upon returning to our camp, and after losing some of their numbers they suddenly began to organize themselves and actually use strategy like that used in professional armies." explained Selena with a frown on her face, Morgan's eyes widening a fraction of an inch. "But that wasn't even the weirdest part. This entirely new and different Danger Beast appeared soon after that and attacked us by breathing out ice like fire, but almost a quickly as it appeared it vanished by flying away."

Morgan's own frown got more defined as he lowered his gaze and began to rub his chin, deep in thought, over what she had just told him. His demeanor only served to make her as well as Selena and Hikari worry and become concerned, the statement Lucena had said about it not being a freak occurrence five days earlier coming back to them.

"Well...that certainly is unusual. But not as unusual as the fact that pretty much the same exact thing happened at Cinigraed back home."

The two sisters and Hikari gasped, Morgan shoving one hand into his pants pockets and fixing his gaze back on them while he removed his cigarette in order to blow out a cloud of smoke. He told them of how the capital of Straelka was attacked in a similar manner, which was unlike any other attack they had encountered before since their lands were especially populated by the creatures, and just like what had happened in the north, a highly unique looking Danger Beast then appeared soon afterwards and commenced its own attack.

Unlike the three headed dragon that had attacked Lucena, Selena and Hikari, however, the one he met was reminiscent of a large bird-like creature that could willlingly produce lightning from thin air itself. And when it seemed like he was going to finally turn the tide to his favor, it suddenly retreated from the area without any second thoughts and left him alone.

"Okay, something is seriously wrong with that. Come on." said Lucena before turning around, leading the small group up to the Imperial. Palace so that they could tell Arthur.

They were all treated to a surprise when, as soon as they opened the doors to the throne room, they saw two people already speaking with the Emperor that they almost instantly recognized. One was an older man wearing a heavy trench coat and a red scarf tied around his throat, was dressed in a black soldier's uniform complete with the pants, belt and boots. What stood out the most was the fiery red hair he sported, which immediately told them who he was without them even having t ask.

"Rafe?" asked Lucena, the former soldier of the Empire turned General of the Western Nations turning around and winking at them.

"Hello Lucena, Selena, Hikari." he said at first before he noticed Morgan and gave him a little salute. "Ah, and I can't forget to the Prince of Straelka of course."

The greetings commenced after that and when everything was all said and done, Lucena, Selena and Hikari were introduced to the second man with Rafe who had teal hair and learned that he was his son, Leonard.

He looked like his father in that he had the strong build, only it was a little leaner, and he also matched his wardrobe style as well to the point they were almost twins. Leonard's hair color came from Fiona, his mother, and also from her did she received the red eyes she had which gave him an appearance not unlike that of a demon. Underneath his arm he held the helmet he wore, and with his other hand he shook everyone's hands while grinning.

"It's a pleasure to meet you Great General. I've heard a lot about your exploits."

"Thanks, same goes to you." replied Lucena before she looked at Arthur and shifted her weight onto one foot while placing a hand on her hip. "So what were you guys talking about?"

In a few minutes time, she learned even the Western Nations had experienced the same strange event that she had in the North and Morgan had back in Straelka, which would totally blow out of the water any doubts in their minds that this was no isolated event. There was something at play in the background considering the same thing had occurred at three different places across the entire world, and they needed to figure out what the source of it all as quickly as possible.

Since Selena had seen the entirety of the battle from its beginning, she stayed behind with Arthur to talk with him alongside Leonard, Rafe and Morgan over the Danger Beast attacks while Lucena and Hikari were allowed to leave.

And when Hikari asked of Lucena what she planned on doing now that she was back in the Imperial Capital, she said back to her, "Well, I was thinking of going to see Mom and Dad, but I have another idea."

All of a sudden she drew Tyrannus' key from its sheath and whirled around, pointing the tip of the rapier at Hikari's chin and motioning with her head back towards the Imperial Training Grounds.

"What do you say about having a little sparring session? I can give you a normal katana to use instead of Murasame, and I won't use Tyrannus or Demon's Extract."

"So, this is purely just to see who's better with a sword?" asked Hikari, Lucena shrugging her shoulders.

"I'm not saying that, I'm just offering a chance for you to get some work in."

Hikari immediately identified the underlying challenge she posed to her and she took a step forward, bringing her face within inches of Lucena's so that she could look her dead in the eyes. "Oh, you are _so_ on."

Lucena laughed with the same grin on her face as her mother's and she wrapped an arm around Hikari's waist, her ice wings manifesting behind her so that she could quickly fly them back to their previous location in no time at all. Once their feet touched solid ground Lucena went to fetch Hikari a regular katana from the armory there, he assassin removing Murasame and it sheath from her side and setting onto the ground.

When Lucena returned she tested the blade's weight in her hand, swinging it through the air a few times to get used to the feel of it before she stared down Lucena and set herself up into a stance.

"I'm so going to beat you." she said when Lucena staggered her feet somewhat and pointed her rapier at her, the grin still present on her face.

"I'll believe it when I see it!"

Hikari hesitated a little in surprise at how quick on her feet the Great General was, and she barely had time to bring up her sword to block Lucena's slash and push aside the blade. She countered with a lunge at Lucena's gut, but she easily sidestepped the stab and twirled around, the back of her heel striking Hikari's raised up arm and knocking her back a few feet.

"What, is that all you got?" she asked in a playful tone, her question making Lucena roll her eyes.

"I was just about to ask the same question of you. Bring it on!"

 **\- Imperial Palace -**

 **\- Five Minutes Later -**

"It seems our only course of action for here on is to wait and see if these unique Danger Beasts make an appearance again, and when that time comes we'll have to act quickly and discover more about them." said Arthur to end the meeting, Rafe and Leonard nodding their heads in unison with Selena and Morgan.

"We'll be taking our leave then." Rafe said with a wave as Leonard put on his helmet and bowed to Arthur, the Emperor returning the gesture so that he and his father could depart from the palace through the use of Rafe's Teigu.

"Are you planning on staying longer, or are you going to return to your home as well? Morgan?"

The Prince shrugged his shoulders and put both hands into their respective pockets, a sigh escaping his lips. "I don't really have to return home yet, I can stick around for a few."

"Well, it's a pleasure to have you here. I hope you enjoy your stay, and I'm sure that Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya wouldn't mind about accommodating you at their home in the meantime?"

"Yeah, I'm sure it'll be fine." said Selena before she tapped Morgan on the shoulder to tell him to follow. "Come on, I'll go ahead and take you there now."

Arthur stood in front of the throne with his arms behind his back and waited for the throne room doors to close behind them before he swiftly turned around and walked around the elevated chair to leave the room through a separate exit. He was going to do his usual check up on Devil's Heart, and before he left he was sure to stop by the Prime Minister's office in order to tell Juno that he was going to be leaving for a few before actually doing so.

The walk there wasn't long, like always, and he was greeted yet again by the Imperial Guards watching over the Teigu Vault before he descended the same steps down through the earth to reach the actual vault itself. He opened the door and walked up to the sealed chamber the vile heart was sealed in and produced his key, unlocking it and opening it up to cast the light within the circular chamber into the secondary vault to illuminate the cage Devil's Heart was trapped behind.

" _Good. Nothing's changed._ " he thought to himself, his body turning to leave and close the door a per custom.

All of a sudden he was paralyzed when a noxious cloud of vile and malicious intent washed over his body, the Emperor turning to glare intensely at the heart. He narrowed his eyes when he saw that the Teigu was beating, which he had discovered it would sometimes do from time to time, but this time it was different. Instead of the usual lazy. And slow beats it would give off, Devil's Heart acted livelier then ever and actually seemed to be excited about something that Arthur had no idea about.

"What are you so ecstatic about…?" he said aloud ass he walked up to the heart, its steady beat making no change in its rhythm despite his presence.

 **\- Imperial Training Grounds -**

Lucena dropped her rapier as soon as she saw Hikari suddenly lose balance and fall over, just barely catching her in time before she could hit the ground.

"Hikari, are you okay? What just happened?" she asked out of concern, Hikari blinking a couple of times.

"Y-Yeah, I'm fine. Whew...that was weird." she said as Lucena helped her back to her feet and dusted her off. "I was fine and then I felt this...weird sensation that made me lose all feeling in my legs for some reason."

Lucena looked into her eyes and saw that she was telling the truth, which made them both get a chill up their spines when they tried to think of what exactly could have caused her to do such a thing. They stood there for a few more seconds in silence before Lucena picked up the katana she had dropped and then grabbed Murasame for her, Hikari thanking her and walking along next to her on her way up into the building overlooking the training grounds.

"What kind of sensation was it, exactly?" asked Lucena once they had left the armory and returned back out into the hallway.

"I can't really explain it, but I had to compare it to something it would be sort of like an adrenaline rush." explained Hikari, her gaze dropping to her hands as she opened and closed them. "I just felt really excited all of a sudden, and then I just blacked out. What scares me the most though was that in that split second between blacking out and you catching me...all I could feel was just unbridled anger."

Lucena gave her that concerned look from earlier and Hikari smiled, silently telling her that she was fine and that worrying wouldn't do her any good.

"Anyways, you look a little tired, so you should head home and get some sleep. I'm going to do the same." said Lucena as she held the door of the exit open for Hikari, the two walking out into the light of the setting sun.

"Yeah...that sounds like a good idea. I'll see you tomorrow."

They departed separately from the Imperial Training Grounds, the two somewhat exhausted women wanting to get home and get some rest for the next day. When she returned home Lucena found Selena and Juno waiting for her, and without a word she followed them out of the entrance hall into an adjoining room so that they could talk.

"So, what happened? What did you guys agree on?" asked Lucena while Selena leaned back against the wall and crossed her arms.

"The only thing we can do is wait. We've never heard nor seen of these Danger Beasts, so we have no information on just what they are and what their habits are like." she said with a sigh, her gaze rising from her feet to her sister. "I hate it, but it's the best course of action right now."

"We of course can't put the people into a state of panic too, so we'll have the handle this situation with extreme caution." added Juno.

Lucena growled under her breath at how helpless they all were against some random Danger Beasts despite their undeniable strength and abilities. But at the same time she had an unnerving sense of anxiety for some reason, especially since why of all times would three unknown, undocumented and pretty powerful Danger Beasts make themselves known? And how could lower tier Danger Beasts suddenly organize themselves in such a way that it would make them seem like an actual army?

It was all mind boggling and a lot to take in, and considering how she was already starting to get a headache from trying to think about it, she was silently thanking God when Tatsumi and Esdeath entered the room and broke up the conversation.

"Why don't you all get some sleep before talking of important matters such as this. I can already tell that you're getting a headache Lucena." said Tatsumi with a chuckle, their first daughter nodding her head and smirking.

"Oh you have no idea…"

"Go on you three." urged on Esdeath to her daughters and Juno, the three each leaving the room one by one after saying goodnight to the two of them.

However, before Lucena could fully leave she noticed the disgruntled look on her face and stopped her with a hand on the shoulder. "Lucena, what's wrong?"

"Oh, nothing Mom. Just thinking of some things is all." replied Lucena with a smile, her response causing both Esdeath and Tatsumi to look at her for a few moments suspiciously.

"Are you sure?" asked Tatsumi.

"Yeah, I'm fine, I promise. Goodnight Mom, Dad." she said to reiterate her point before leaving, Tatsumi and Esdeath watching her go in silence.

As soon as she was locked away within the comfort of her own bedroom, Lucena lost the fake smile she had put on to deter her parents from worrying and didn't even bother changing out of her clothes, instead just sitting down on the side of her bed and staring at the single window situated across from it.

" _I'll wait until everyone is asleep and then go to Arthur about what happened with Hikari. He's got to know something about it._ "


	52. Midnight Terror

A/N I'm figuring out more and more of the plot for this second part that takes place between the beginning and ending with each passing day, and I'm hoping that it will be able to appease you guys. Personally I think it's going to be cool, but the final verdict is left up to you guys, so I can only hope, wait and see. And I apologize, I haven't added Morgan to the the wiki yet, so I'll be sure to add him soon. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 51 - Midnight Terror**

 **\- 12:05 A.M -**

Lucena had waited for a good while to be sure everyone within the mansion had retired for the night before quietly sneaking over to her bedroom window and opening it up to the cold night air outside. She climbed out through the square hole and stood on the roof tiles just underneath the ledge for a few moments, her eyes and ears open for any sign of people that could discover her, but when nothing came back she took off for the Imperial Palace by leaping from rooftop to rooftop.

She didn't dare use Demon's Extract since her mother would easily be able to sense it, so she used another less conventional way that would still enable her to get to the palace without any trouble. Once she was close enough she dropped down onto the street and walked the rest of the way, passing by the Imperial Guards on the night shift before making her way to the palace gardens.

And just like her hunch had told her, she saw the less-then-human Emperor taking a casual stroll through the flower beds since he hardly required sleep. When her footsteps were registered by Arthur he turned and held his arms behind his back while he raised an eyebrow out of intrigue.

"Lucena? What are you doing here at this time of night?"

 **\- House of Akame and Wave -**

Hikari rolled over onto her side for probably the tenth time in a matter of five minutes and groaned under her breath, the sweat beads sliding down her forehead beginning to accumulate in her pillow sheet and form a slight stain. Her heart was running faster then it should be when asleep, and every position she tried only brought discomfort.

Within her mind she kept hearing these strange and unknown whispers that threatened to drive her insane, or worse, deprive her of sleep like it had been for the last four hours. It was a strange type of dream, not really a nightmare, but she couldn't do anything to try and silence the voices in her head.

Then, all of a sudden, the whispers totally vanished without a trace and she was blessed with a moment of silence before her entire body just froze up and a voice brimming with evil came into existence from the shadows of her thoughts.

" _Come to me. Come!_ "

She jolted awake and almost instantly a black hand covered in what she could only guess was armor snapped tightly around her throat, terror and horror starting to overwhelm her senses as she looked at what the hand belonged to. A dark figure cloaked entirely in shadows that hid its identity from her, the only defining characteristic she could get being that it was wearing some sort of armor that possessed no openings whatsoever, save for the thinly carved slit that displayed the ghastly glow of two orange eyes.

"You are mine." was all the figure said before the shadows cloaking its body began to seep out of his hand and go into Hikari.

She struggled and tried to break free from the grip of this unknown figure, but with every effort she made her body grew weaker and weaker. She stared into the eyes of the armored figure and she felt her consciousness begin to fade away, and something else far more sinister begin to assert its dominance over her and take control.

"No...I...stop it!" she said in defiance, but the armored figure payed no attention to her pleas and reached out with its second hand, index finger extended out, towards her forehead.

"Come to me...we have work to do."

The figure touched the tip of his finger to Hikari's forehead and almost instantly she lost all feeling in her arms and legs, her body become a rag doll that freely allowed the being to finish what it had started.

All of sudden the nightmare ended and Hikari's eyes shot wide open as she awoke, but...something was wrong. Her normally blue eyes had lost their color and had instead gained a crimson red hue that seemed to glow in the darkness of her bedroom. She silently climbed out from underneath the covers and walked over to the nearby closet in order to start getting dressed, the stoic expression on her face hardly changing.

The sweat beads on her forehead had also vanished entirely, and every part of her posture and demeanor gave off a an eery sense of calm. Even her breathing was controlled to the point it sounded almost unnatural. After slipping on her second shoe she turned around and stared out through her bedside window, her gaze locking onto the Imperial Palace in the distance.

" _Go._ "

 **\- Imperial Palace Gardens -**

"Sorry Arthur, but I have something on my mind that's really bothering me, and I thought that you would be able to help." stated Lucena while rubbing her arm out of regret, the Emperor chuckling and walking over to her.

Arthur nod his head out of understanding and urged her on to speak, "Of course, I'd be happy to help. Tell me, what's bothering you?"

"Well...it's something that has to do with Hikari." said Lucena in a low tone.

"What of her?"

"The day before, after we left her when you, Selena, and the other started talking, Hikari and I went to the Imperial Training Grounds to have a little mock sword fight, and right in the middle of it she just suddenly lost all feeling in her body and very nearly collapsed." Lucena explained with a concerned expression, Arthur beginning to develope one of his own just from the tone of voice she was using.

"Could it have been from exhaustion?" he asked to try and discover a rational solution.

Lucena shook her head and crossed her arms over her chest, her gaze dropping from Arthur's when the memories of the terrifying experience came back to haunt her. "No, she described it as something along the lines of an adrenaline rush. She felt an extreme sense of excitement within her before all of a sudden she just shut down, like a switch had been flipped."

Now it was Arthur's turn to start thinking to determine the answer to their predicament, and the first idea that popped into his head wasn't very reassuring, far from it actually.

" _No...it couldn't be...that's preposterous…_ "

"What scared me the most though was that she said in the split second between blacking out and me catching her...she felt an overwhelming feeling of anger." finished Lucena with a worried look at the Emperor, who turned himself away from her slightly and rubbed the end of his chin with his hand, tapping it a few times while deep in thought.

"Arthur?"

He jumped a little like she had snuck up on him, but he quickly recovered his posture and returned his hand to rest with the other behind his back. "I apologize, I delved too deep into my own thoughts."

"What were you thinking of? Do you know why that happened to Hikari?"

"Possibly...but I don't like it, and neither will you." he replied with a grim look coming from his eyes and furrowed brow, which only served to make Lucena feel even more worried for Hikari.

"Yesterday, after I finished my discussion with your sister, Raphael and his son, I performed my usual check on the Teigu Devil's Heart within the vault. For some reason, it suddenly got excited and beat at a faster rate then ever before, as if it could feel that its potential user was close by. I myself felt somewhat perplexed and infatuated with the heart, but I was able to restrain myself easily enough and leave. But if what you're saying about Hikari is true, and that these events are actually linked…"

They both froze up when an immense amount of killer intent washed over and through their bodies from somewhere behind the palace grounds, and both of them knew exactly where it came from without a doubt. They quickly left the palace gardens and ran as fast as they could to the Imperial Teigu vault, arriving to a scene taken straight out of a nightmare that sent chills running up and down their spines.

"Oh no…" murmured Arthur as they walked by the crumpled and bloody corpse of guards who had been killed through the use of a blade.

Lucena approached one body slumped up against the wall next to the entrance for the staircase and she immediately recognized the black marks stretching across the man's skin from top to bottom. A sense of horror gripped her heart as she turned to face Arthur and gulped nervously, the Emperor himself seeing them and shivering again.

"They were killed by Murasame...wait, Lucena!" shouted Arthur when Lucena suddenly flung open the stairwell door and vanished into the darkness after her friend. "Damn, I need to find help fast!"

"Hikari!" she called out when she travelled a good length of the way down, her eyes quickly adjusting to the darkness and her sense of space and range giving her the ability too descend the stairs relatively quickly.

When no response came back to her she ran even faster down the stairs until finally she arrived at the vault door itself, and without a second thought she stepped through the passageway past the door and entered the circular room beyond. She kept Tyrannus close at hand in case she needed to activate the armor, but she wanted to try and talk with Hikari first to figure out what was wrong and why this was all happening.

"Hikari?" she asked as she slowly approached the secondary vault door, which was hanging slightly ajar from its hinges.

She gripped the door and slowly pulled it open to give her ample room to step inside, the pitch black darkness of the holding chamber receding little by little as the faint light from the main vault poured inside.

Hikari was standing on the opposite side of the room directly in front of the cage that contained Devil's Heart, and in her hand Lucena could see Murasame, it's blade soaked with the blood of its most recent victims. She was standing perfectly still, and hardly reacted to her entrance despite how close they were to one another.

"H-Hikari? Are you okay?" asked Lucena with a stutter.

Hikari didn't respond, so Lucena inched forward another step to get a better look at what her body was hiding from view. Suddenly Hikari dropped Murasame to the ground, the blade clanging against the stone floor and producing a ear-splitting racket that made Lucena cringe and pause in her cautious approach.

Then with a single hand Hikari reached up to the base of her neck and pulled off her father's scarf, followed by using both to unbutton her uniform and shrug it off somewhat where it hung loosely around the crooks of her arms.

"He called to me…"

Lucena was almost surprised by the sound of Hikari's since she had been entirely focused on watching what she was doing. "W-What? Who called to you?"

Unfortunately Hikari did not respond to her question and proceeded to unbutton the white dress shirt she wore underneath her uniform down to just underneath her chest, opening it up just enough to show off the top portion of her chest and decent amount of her cleavage.

"Now he's going to come back...and there's nothing you can do to stop it…" muttered Hikari again before gasping harshly, Lucena now fearing for her more so then ever before.

Her body was paralyzed in fear when Hikari took a step to the right and slowly turned to face her, revealing the empty holding cage for Devil's Heart first, and then when she fully faced her she covered her mouth in shock at the sight of the skin at the base of her neck closing itself up to hide the heart.

Once it fully assimilated itself with her, Hikari buttoned up the dress shirt again as well as her uniform, hiding the fact she that had just took Devil's Heart. Then she opened up her left hand and stared intensely at Lucena with a cold, hard gaze devoid of any expression, the Great General taking a step back when a razor-sharp bone protrusion emerged from the palm of her hand.

"Hikari, I don't know what's gotten into you, but I'm not letting you leave!" exclaimed Lucena, Hikari cocking her to the right in response like she didn't understand.

"It's already too late."

Suddenly the entire room began to shake and rumble like an earthquake had just spawned beneath the Imperial Capital, then without warning the entire ceiling burst apart into a shower of dirt and stone that forced Lucena to protect herself with an ice shield, Hikari merely grinning at her when two spiraling tusks forced their way into the vault from above.

"Farewell."

"Hikari!" shouted Lucena when she grabbed onto one of the tusks and was lifted out of the room, Lucena running to the spot directly underneath the hole and gasping when she saw the mole-like Danger Beast Leonard had described staring right back at her.

The creature screeched at her before burrowing through the earth across from it and vanished from sight, Arthur appearing soon after from the vault itself and staring up with her.

"What just happened?! Where's Hikari?!"

"One of those unknown Danger Beasts just left with her, and she took Devil's Heart with her!" said Lucena back as she leaped up after the Danger Beast, motioning with an extended hand and finger to the surface. "Find anyone that you can!"

With that she gave chase after the mole-like Danger Beast and Hikari, her rapier glowing as she swept it to the side and donned Tyrannus the unconventional way while on the run,

Hikari glanced back over he shoulder from her position atop the Danger Beast's back and narrowed her eyes upon seeing their pursuer, her attention returning to the creature when she placed a hand on its leathery skin. " _Karkatus, rise._ "

The Danger Beast screeched in response and turning on a dime straight upward it began to make its way towards the surface, Lucena having to stop and manifested her ice wings in order to keep the chase going. When the beast finally emerged from the earth just outside the wall protecting the Imperial Capital, it quickly scurried away as a larger form took its spot to wait for Lucena.

When she soared out of the hole she just had barely enough time to create an ice barrier to take the brunt of the blow made by a large curled up fist that came from out of nowhere. She recovered herself mid-flight and gasped when she saw the new Danger Beast unlike the three already seen thus far yet at the same time very similar to them standing before her. It was a large, fox-like creature that remarkably had nine flowing tails and silver fur, the tips of its tails a blazing scarlet color, as well as a several small horns emerging from it forehead.

It roared at her and she had to fly away again when the Danger Beast spread its maw wide open and created a sphere of fire that was launched at her at break-neck speed.

"Grauhorn!" bellowed Lucena as she created several large shards of ice in the air, five razor-sharp pillars of ice shooting out from them and going right for the Danger Beast.

It brought one of its tails around and encased it in flames a fraction of a second before smashing aside the ice, negating the attack almost immediately. Lucena growled before she barreled right for the being and reared her arm back, the fist then flying forward and striking the Danger Beast in the direct center of its forehead. It reeled back from the devastation blow, Lucena following it up by flying to the ground underneath it and slamming her hands to the ground to enact her next technique.

She sent a huge column of ice rocketing up into the Danger Beast's gut that carried it off the ground and into the air. She then followed up by summoning a huge chunk of ice that she used to crush the Danger Beast from above and keep it pinned beneath the two hunks of ice, but just when she thought she had won the fox-like creature roared and literally ignited its entire body on fire to melt its way out of the ice.

When it was free the fire vanished and the Danger Beast brought around all nine of its tails, Lucena bracing herself with a layer of ice before she was knocked away by them and sent flying back towards the Imperial Capital.

She grunted when she struck something mid air and opened her eyes, gasping to see that she was caught by Wave, who had donned Grand Chariot's armor and was flying with her thanks to the two wings sprouting out of his back.

"You okay?" he asked as he let go of her, Lucena nodding.

"Yeah, thanks for that. I'm guessing Arthur already told you what's happened?"

"Mhmm. He came to Akame and I first and I left as soon as he finished, so I can only assume he's either on his way to tell Esdeath, Tatsumi and your sisters or he already has done so and they're going to be here soon."

Lucena smirked and manifested the frozen Neuntote in her right hand while Wave narrowed his eyes and clenched his fists, his beastial urges and instincts beginning to come up from within as he stared at the Danger Beasts.

" _Xelles, retreat._ " spoke a voice into the fox creature's head, the Danger Beast snarling and glaring at its enemies for a few moments before it turned tail and full-on sprinted away so suddenly and at such speed Lucena and Wave had no time to react and give chase.

"Dammit, just like before…" growled Lucena in frustration as she deactivated Tyrannus, Wave returning to normal as well when they landed atop the capital defensive wall.

There was no sign of Hikari or the second Danger Beast she had escaped with, and now that the fox-like Danger Beast had just left, they had literally nothing to go off of except for what they had left behind.

"Lucena! Wave!"

They turned and saw Arthur, followed by Lucena's parents, Maya, Juno, and Akame, leap up onto the wall from within the city and run over to them, each with a differing but all the same look of worry painted on their face.

"Where did Hikari go?" asked Akame when she went straight to Wave, the man sighing heavily and wrapping his arms around her.

"She's gone...I don't know where she went."

Akame bit her lip and buried her face into his shoulder, Wave gently caressing her hair with his hand and sympathizing with her about the disappearance of their daughter.

"Lucena, I know I asked you earlier, but what exactly happened down there in that vault with Hikari? Why was she taken by those Danger Beasts?" questioned Arthur, Lucena sliding Tyrannus' key into it sheath and sighing heavily.

"She wasn't taken...she willingly went with them."

A blanket of dead silence draped itself over the gathering when she revealed one of many horrible truths about what had just occurred. Wave and Akame stared at her with wide eyes and open mouths, Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya only looked at her in disbelief, and Arthur remains silent with his eyes closed.

She told them word for word, detail for detail of her encounter with the changed Hikari down in the vault built to contain Devil's Heart, and when she got to the part about her taking the Teigu and allowing it to merge itself with her body, everyone was left with a sense of dread that paralyzed them in terror. They all started to think that she was going to end up becoming another cruel sadist like Jacqueline, but Lucena changed that thought quickly when she mentioned that she showed no change in demeanor upon taking the heart, and that she spoke of someone coming back.

"Who is going to come back? Did she tell you?" asked Tatsumi in the hopes that they would at least get one piece of solid information, but Lucena shook her head regretfully.

"No...she didn't. But I could tell that there was definitely something wrong with her. She didn't smile once until after she escaped, and her blue eyes were crimson red." she said, her gaze moving to her parents. "Someone, orr *something, was controlling her. Hikari would never do something like this."

 **\- Twenty Miles away from Imperial Capital -**

Far away from the reach of the Imperial Capital, Hikari hopped off the back of the mole-like Danger Beast named Karkatus and looked up at it and the Danger Beast known as Xelles, the two watching as a slight transformation took hold with her in which her black hair shifted contrast to a bleached white.

"Xelles, Karkatus, I thank you for your assistance." she said blankly, her gaze darting over to theformer. "Find Gigardos and Skessa, tell them to meet Karkatus and I at the Bastion."

The fox demon Danger Beast nod its head once before it ran off towards the northeast, its gargantuan body vanishing once it jumped down into a nearby canyon. Now with it gone, Hikari leaped back onto the back of Karkatus and reared it to turned its gaze to the far south, the location she had in mind coming into her brain like a long-lost memory that had faded away from the passing of time.

"It's time. Let us be off."


	53. Return of the Damned

A/N Hm...guys, I'm no doctor, but the diagnosis I give for this situation is SHIT IS HITTING THE FAN. What exactly is going on with Devil's Heart? Where is this sentiment personality coming from, and what's up with the armored figure that took control of Hikari? The piss? Hehe, yeah, I can already see the plot developing before my very eyes. And once again, I'm sorry I don't have more of Morgan's info on the wiki, his page his done but there's barely anything there. College is hitting me hard with papers and crud, and that takes priority. Sorry. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 52 - Return of the Damned**

 **\- Unknown Amount of Years Before -**

"What is the meaning of this?! Who are you! I demand to know the reason as to why you are here!"

"Is something the matter?"

"Stay back Noctis, I'll handle this."

"There has to be a logical reason behind this, don't kill them! We can talk this through!"

"You dare threaten me?! You insolent wretches, I'll slaughter you!"

"No!"

"Y-You...you killed them...why? We could've used other methods to stop them!"

"Those pests...there's no chance of living in peace with them. The only worth they hold in this world is beneath us, as slaves, and I won't stop until they're all subjugated like the vermin they are."

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

 **\- Present Day -**

A couple of days had passed since Hikari's abrupt departure from the capital with the company of two of the unknown Danger Beasts that had been causing trouble around the globe, and tensions were high among the populace and the leaders who were having trouble discerning the reasoning behind the drastic change in their friend.

Almost immediately after she had left Lucena had gathered a search party comprised of herself, a few Imperial Scouts, and some Imperial Guards in order to try and track down Hikari, and it was on the third day that they returned empty handed and heavy-hearted.

No one was more affected by Hikari's leaving more so then her parents and Lucena, and the former personally apologized on the verge of tears to Wave and Akame of letting her leave, and that she'll continue to try and find her through any means possible.

"I feel so bad for her...losing someone close to you like that in such a fashion must be wreaking havoc on her." murmured Juno as she stood with Selena from down below in the city, their gazes on Lucena, who was atop the capital defensive wall staring intensely at the direction Hikari had run off to.

"Yeah. And what's even worse is that she took that damned Teigu too, and considering what she said...it sends chills up my spine still." replied Selena with a shiver.

They waited for another minute before they left their sister alone with her thoughts and went on their way, walking back towards the city's interior sections. "So, what's your plan for the rest of the day?"

Selena glanced at Juno when the question was posed to her and she smiled, her left hand instinctively going too her right and gentle caressing the golden ring she wore around her ring finger. Ever since she had left the capital earlier on to participate in the civil war up north, she had been eager to came back home and fulfill a promise she had made with a certain someone before leaving, and now that it had happened her days were always brighter then usual.

"Go home, you know. Relax a little." she replied, Juno grinning and raising an eyebrow.

"Oh? Have you two had the talk yet?"

Selena blushed as they rounded a corner and slowly nod her head, Juno having to keep herself from squealing in delight because of the huge step her sister was planning on taking.

They talked some more for the rest of the way until arriving at a nice-looking house larger then most built on a sizeable estate, Juno bidding farewell to Selena before moving on to return to the Imperial Palace and resume her duties as Prime Minister. She enjoyed these moments of peace with her family, since she hardly could ever get them since she had one of the busiest jobs in the Empire, advising the Emperor and such while also running a majority of the logistics involved with a nation as large as the Empire, but she loved it nonetheless. It was the same for Selena and Lucena as well as their parents, because they hardly got to see her as well outside of work and really get to enjoy one another's company.

Selena waved goodbye to her before opening the wrought iron gate to her new home, the one she had only just recently moved her stuff to from her parent's house, and walking towards the front door.

"I'm home!"

She didn't get even five feet beyond the door before a pair of arms were thrown around her and squeezed her, her smile widening and her blush coming back full force from the sudden hug.

"Welcome back." said a man a dull auburn hair color, the toothpick stuck in between his lips shifting over to the far right corner of his mouth when he smiled.

"What did I say about surprising me like that Akio?" asked Selena when he let go of her, the General turning to face the one person outside of her own family that she loved with all of her heart.

"Have to keep you on your toes somehow." he said with a chuckle before they kissed and walked together down the hallway further into the house. "How is she doing? She any better?"

Selena shook her head sadly and plopped down onto the one couch in their living room, throwing off her flip flops at the same time as she removed the hair band that kept her hair in a pony tail. "No. Lucena still goes to the same spot every day. She's hurting bad, and it irritates me that I can't do anything to cheer her up."

"I bet. She was always so cheerful when Hikari would stop by the Training Grounds from time to time." said Akio as he sat down next to her.

They sat there in silence for a few moments unsure of what to say about the matter before Akio clapped his hands together and immediately stood back up to again, saying, "Well, how about tonight I cook. You just relax and it'll be done before you know it."

"Thank you."

Akio disappeared into the connecting kitchen and Selena tucked her legs up on the couch to get into a more comfortable position, her eyes wandering around the room until coming to rest on the small table to her right. She smiled and a warm fuzzy feeling sprouted within her when she looked at the grouping of photo frames propped up on the glass table, her eyes gravitating to one in particular.

She reached across the couch arm and grabbed it, bringing the picture over back to her so she could look at it closely and reminisce at the moment in time that was memorialized in paper.

It was a picture of Akio and her after they had gotten married, Selena still in her beautiful wedding dress that she had made for her thanks to her parents, and Akio in the sharp white tux. They both had smiles on their faces, and she could remember how happy her parents, Lucena and Juno had been.

She had met Akio when she had gone to the Imperial Training Grounds to talk with Lucena, and among all of the Imperial Guards there her eyes had met his and from then, something just _clicked_. They started to see each other more and more to the point Lucena got suspicious and used her authority as Great General to discover the truth, and when she did she surprised them both by encouraging their relationship.

" _And now, here we are…_ " she thought, the memories fading away with the return of the picture to its rightful spot among the other frakes sporting pictures of her family among other things.

"Selena, it's all done!" announced Akio from the kitchen, bringing her back out of her thoughts to reality.

"Coming!"

 **\- The Uncharted Territory, Far South -**

Far away from the eyes of civilization towards the southern tip of the continent rested the Uncharted Territory, a large swath of icy and frigidly cold land that had yet to been explored by any human. There had been many expeditions to try and map the area, but the closest thing mankind could settle for was an outline of the coastline because every attempt had been thwarted by the raging snow and ice storms that plagued the frozen tundra. It had remained virtually untouched for hundreds of thousands of years due to these snowstorms, and it would remain like that for thousands more since there was hardly any lapse between the snowstorms that masked the territory.

Hikari's eyes remained squinted as she and Karkatus made their way though the ice and snow, the raging storm above them sending whirlwinds down onto them to slow their advance towards a hidden destination. The Danger Beast was unaffected by the cold air thanks to its thick, leathery skin, and Hikari was able to withstand the cold thanks to heat it was giving off.

There was no chance of them being followed into the wasteland, since no normal human could survive in the cold, and after every footstep Karkatus took the imprint in the snow was instantly wiped clean like it had never been there in the first place.

When it seemed like the snowstorm would only get worse, Hikari noticed a large black structure coming into existence from the wind and snow, and after a few more minutes of trudging the outline became more distinct and grew larger and larger the closer they got.

" _The Bastion…_ " thought Hikari when the structure finally became clear to the two of them, revealing itself as a massive stone fortress that was shaped like a star, with huge walls and battlements that were showing wear and tear from the constant battering from the icy wind.

Karkatus stopped when a ear-piercing shriek echoed from above, the Danger Beast and Hikari looking to the left when another Danger Beast reminiscent of a large bird swooped down and came to rest next to it.

"Gigardos, welcome back." said Hikari, the Danger Beast blinking as its response before it motioned with its head to their right.

At the same time the other two Danger Beasts, Xelles and Skessa, emerged from the snowstorm, and with a roar the latter suddenly changed the snowstorm where the large citadel was no longer within the storm itself and instead rested in an eye that Skessa had created. The storm continued to rage around them, but as a result of Skessa the weather around the Bastion was now calm and tranquil.

"Wait here." ordered Hikari as she leaped off Karkatus' back, the Danger Beasts relaxing somewhat and watching her walk through the open gate into the first of many courtyards.

Even though she had never been here before, the layout of the Bastion was readily available in her mind and she easily made her way through the many hallways and corridors that led her into the fortress interior. Unlike most fortresses, this ancient building possessed a large throne room, and upon arriving there, her destination, Hikari pushed open the heavy doors and stood rigidly still when cold air hit her skin again, her eyes shooting up and noticing the massive hole punched through the ceiling that was allowing in the air from outside. There were also large snow mounds littering the floor and icicles hanging from the portions of the ceilings that were intact, the untouched room within a totally different time era then anything else she's seen.

What caught her eye the most out of everything however was the throne sitting directly across from her at the end of the hall, and resting in it slumped over was a figure dressed entirely in dark maroon armor sporting a unique design and horns protruding out from the helmet.

Upon laying eyes on the figure she felt Devil's Heart's beat pick up pace inside of her, the Teigu reacting to it's presence by getting excited. Hikari walked forward and began to remove her clothing once again, taking off her scarf and uniform first, then dropping them to the ground as she slowly approached the corpse.

When she reached her dress shirt she fully unbuttoned it and shrugged it off to where the sleeves bunched up around her wrists and the shirt itself fell off and hung around her waist, revealing her breasts and taking away any barriers that could stand in the way of Devil's Heart. When she came within a few feet of the throne and the armored figure, she stopped and glanced down at her chest, the skin just at the base of her neck splitting apart as Devil's Heart forced its way out of her and leaped down onto her outstretched hand.

When her chest healed itself back to its prior condition the heart jumped from her hand to the chest plate of the corpse, the heart doing nothing for a few moments before several tendrils snaked out from its body and tore open the armor until a hole big enough for it to fit through was created. It slipped inside into the body and dropped down into the skeleton resting inside, the tendrils then multiplying by the thousands and spreading out through the body's limbs to the very tips of its toes.

The tendrils began to bunch together and form ligaments, and when those were completed they began to build atop one another again to form muscles, the heart secreting its own blood as well that began to circulate through the newly created flesh and organs and give them life.

Hikari remained silent and watched with a stoic expression as the the body's creation was finalized, the armor itself now coming to life when several brightly glowing orange marks reminiscent of veins appeared, and soon enough the figure's chest began to slowly move up and down as breaths of air were circulated in and out of its lungs for the first time in millions of years. Orange and yellow eyes with slit pupils appeared in the thinly cut slit of the helmet and the being finally picked itself up, its stare doing nothing to faze Hikari as it stood up to its full height and towered over her.

"I thank you for returning my heart to me. Tell me, what is the name of such a beautiful young woman?" asked the masculine being in a deep gravely voice, its eyes closely scanning Hikari's figure from top too bottom.

"Hikari." she replied blankly.

"Ah, a wonderful name. My name is Mephistopheles, but since you were the one to revive me, I will give you the right to call me Mephisto." said the person before he lifted his right hand up and pointed an index finger outward, the razor sharp tip moving in to touch the base of her neck.

"As thanks for your loyalty...I will grant you a portion of my strength."

Hikari flinched a little when he punctured the very surface of her skin with his finger, and to her shock she felt an unknown liquid begin to inject itself into her body and bloodstream, Mephisto's finger acting like a syringe used by a doctor. As more of the liquid was transferred into her, she could steadily feel her strength grow alongside every one of her senses. Her sight became clearer, her hearing sharper, everything felt like it was getting an upgrade thanks to the unknown fluid now coursing through her veins.

Suddenly her hair began to change color as well, its black color shifting to a lighter and lighter shade until it was all bleach white, and then when Mephisto removed his finger a mark similar in appearance to a heart appeared in the same spot. It was a physical marker and binding symbol that showed her allegiance to the unknown armored figure, and when that was completed Mephisto held his hands behind his back and motioned with his head to her discarded clothes.

"It is done, and you may dress yourself, there is no need to reveal yourself like that to me." he said before he wrapped an arm around her shoulders and started to walk her back towards the throne on entrance, a chuckle resonating from his helmet. "And when you're done, I want to talk with you. I have been gone for quite some time, and the only experience of this new world I have is that through which I saw through my heart. I am very interested to hear what you have to say."

When Hikari had recovered her articles of clothing and put them back on, she followed Mephisto through the ancient fortress to a large library that held many books from an age she had never even heard of, the books themselves surprisingly still in good condition even though they had been resting here for an unknown amount of time.

"Have a seat, Hikari." said Mephisto while pulling up a chair across from his, the young assassin sitting down and leaning back into the soft and slightly chilled leather.

Mephisto took his own seat, his armor rattling and clinking somewhat as he did, and then crossed one leg over the other before clearing his throat and asking, "Now that we're all settled, let us begin, shall we?"

"Well, actually, if you wouldn't mind, I would like for you to answer some questions of my own." said Hikari in a reserved manner, Mephisto blinking a few times and chuckling.

"But of course, this all must be quite new to you, and you hardly know of me other then my name."

Mephisto cleared his throat and laid a hand on his chest in reference to himself, saying, "As you already know, my name is Mephistopheles. And like you saw earlier on when you returned my heart to me, I had been dead for quite some time. I can't recall when my heart was transformed into what you call a "Teigu", but ever since it was first removed from my body by my killers, I have seen the world in a sense through it, and most recently, through the eyes of a vessel that managed to subjugate my will and use my strength for their own purposes."

" _He must mean that old Great General…_ " thought Hikari while Mephisto continued to tell her about some of his past.

"But after I was removed from her, I was able to regain myself and work to find you, Hikari, to act as my temporary vessel so that you may come here and return my heart to me."

"Why did you choose me?" she asked.

"I sensed that you were special, a rare breed of human that is not often seen." stated Mephisto with the pointing of a clawed finger at her. "You possess the blood of a Human and the blood of a Danger Beast within you, a hybrid that can access extraordinary strength if given the proper guidance. You are the culmination of an idea that has long since faded into the black abyss of myth and legend."

Hikari lowered her gaze to look down at her hands and focus on them intensely, feeling the special blood flowing through her veins and marveling at the fact that there was more to her case outside of being a hybrid.

"The main reason why I need you though is I need your help."

"Yes...I remember you saying that we had work to do. May I ask what exactly you meant by that?" questioned Hikari of the elder individual, Mephisto resting his hands in his lap and closing his eyes.

"Allow me to tell you a story, young Hikari, a story of an age long forgotten…"

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

Selena stepped into her closet with a blush on her face, her and racing at over a hundred miles per hour over the fact how quickly the night's events had shifted in such a way. Akio and her had finished eating a few minutes earlier, and a minute hadn't even gone by before they had started to talk again about one of their more recent discussions over a bottle of wine.

That's when she had dropped the bomb on him, that she was ready for it to happen.

"Are you sure?" he had asked, and she had replied with a heartfelt yes.

And so here they were, in their bedroom with the door shut. Akio was sitting on one side of the bed facing away from the closet while Selena herself was within it, removing her evening clothes and mentally preparing herself at the same time her husband was. She had somewhat prepared for when this time would come, and after removing her shirt and regular bra and panties she reached into a cubby and pulled out some folded clothes that she had bought recently.

" _I hope he likes these…_ "

Meanwhile Akio was twiddling his thumbs in slight nervousness as he heard the sounds of his wife rummaging around through the closet, and to be quite honest he was finding it difficult to keep his imagination from running wild and thinking of what exactly she was doing in there.

He shook his head to clear himself of any dirty thoughts and focused again on the wall in front of him, which only lasted for about five seconds because he heard the closest door creak open behind him and the soft footsteps of Selena as she walked out from it.

"Okay, I'm ready now…"

Akio slowly brought his head around, not knowing what to expect, and stared in silent awe of what his wife had changed into. She was standing awkwardly with her arms behind her back and her weight partially on her right leg in probably the sexiest outfit he had ever seen her in, his gaze causing her to blush even more. What she had bought to wear was a set of elegant white lingerie, white stockings, and a matching garter belt that held them up. The bra fit her breasts perfectly in their soft embrace, but they had just enough tightness in them to the point Akio could barely make out the outline of her nipples through the fabric.

"Selena, I…" he started to say, but he couldn't think of the correct words to say and just continued to stare.

"W-What do you t-think?" she asked nervously, never having felt this exposed in her life.

Akio blinked twice before he got up from the bed and made his way around it over to her, the shocked expressions he wore morphing into a smile. "You look absolutely _gorgeous_."

Selena's blush entered a whole new deeper shade of red and she averted her gaze for a fraction of a second, her arms then moving on their own to wrap around his neck so that she could kiss him. Their lips remained connected even when Selena took a step forward and managed to push Akio and herself down onto the bed, the soft cushion of the mattress and covers dampening their fall to a soft thump.

Selena pulled away from Akio and stared into his eyes as she straddled him, with her hands pressing down into the bed sheets on either side of his head and her knees hugging his sides, while Akio held her by the hips and began to slowly bring them down across her soft skin.

His fingers moved past the garter belt and around her panties to gently caress both of her ass cheeks, Selena biting her lower lip and moaning out of pleasure in response to his touch.

"I really am lucky to have met you, Selena." said Akio with absolute meaning behind his words.

"I am too…" replied Selena in almost a whipper before she and Akio kissed again, his hands coming up from her ass to her back where he fidgeted with the clasp for her bra and unclipped it.

Selena leaned back until she was sitting on his midsection and smiled as she removed the bra and covered her breasts with an arm, teasing him for a few moments. When she felt like he had waited long enough she dropped her arm, giving Akio an unrestricted view of her seemingly perfect breasts in all of their glory.

He couldn't hold himself back and cupped both of them in his hands, relishing in the feeling of the two soft mounds when he squeezed them gently. Selena let out another tiny moan of pleasure when he did and Akio started to use his index fingers to cases her nipples, flicking them ever-so-softly and pinching them in between it and his thumb to make her feel as good as possible.

She leaned forward closer to him and he took full advantage of it, leaning his head forward a little so that he could bring his mouth into the equation, Selena sucking in a sharp breath of air when he wrapped his lips around her right breast's nipple and sucked on it.

When he was done with that one he moved over to the left nipple to give it some attention, Selena moaning this time in a louder, more high-pitched tone then before. Her mind was starting to get foggy, so before she lost the ability to think cognitively she got him to stop and leaned back up, smiling happily as she looked down and used a single finger to move aside her panties and reveal her aroused sex.

"I want you now…" she asked, Akio nodding once.

She waited patiently for him to unbutton his boxer shorts, and when his erect member was freed from the fabric of clothing she took it into her own hand and positioned it directly underneath the entrance to her sex. Selena rubbed the head a few times against her folds and shivered a little at the strange feeling, but without any fear in her heart she pushed it past them into her, let go and placed her hands on Akio's chest, and with his hands on her hip to guide her she fully took in his cock and gasped.

Her inner walls were spread apart for the first time and she was assaulted with mixed feelings of pain and pleasure, her status as a virgin vanishing with this act.

"Selena, are you okay?" asked Akio out of fear that she might have been hurt.

"N-No, I'm fine…" she replied with a shaky breath. "Just wait for a minute…"

Selena had to give herself a few moments to catch her breath and get used to the unorthodox feeling of having Akio inside of her. When the pain faded away she fixed her gaze with Akio's and nod her head once, telling him that she was ready to continue, and started to move her hips up and down with his help. They started slow, the wet, squishing sound of his dick sliding in and out of her wet sex more emphasized since they weren't going as fast, but when they both got used to the rhythm and motion of having sex they picked up the pace.

Akio removed his hands from her hips and returned them to her breasts, holding and squeezing them as she rode him and finally lost all sense of rationality within her thoughts. She was smiling and letting out a breath laced with lust and pleasure with every motion she made, and it only got better when he started to fondle her breasts again.

"Ah...I love this...A-Akio, I love you!" she proclaimed, her call lighting a fire within her husband that caused him to spring up and push her down onto her back, hands driving into the crooks of the back of her legs and pushing them back until her legs were up in the air, feet near his shoulders.

He pistoned in and out of her at a rapid pace, slowing down every so often to catch his breath before continuing on, and fully committed himself to fulfilling their sexual and love-filled desires for one another. Selena gripped the bedsheets with one hand and rested the other one across her body just underneath her breasts to prevent them from bouncing back and forth, a tiny bit of drool rolling down the side of her cheek from her lips from the ecstasy coursing through her veins like boiling hot lava.

"Selena, I...I'm going to…"

"Inside...let it all go inside…" pleaded Selena when he let go of her legs and returned his hands to her hips, her legs then wrapped around his lower back. "Cum inside of me!"

Akio let out a final grunt before he pushed as deep as he could inside of her, Selena moaning in pleasure when she felt thick streams of his semen pour deep into her and fill up her womb. Akio sighed heavily and when Selena dropped her legs he pulled out of her and fell onto his back with his head pressing into one of their pillows. Selena, after covering somewhat, crawled over to him and laid down next to him on his right, her head coming to rest next to his and her breasts pressed up against his left arm and bicep.

"I love you." she whispered into his ear, Akio chuckling in response.

"I love you too."

 **\- Unknown Location, Far West -**

Within an almost pitch black expanse somewhere underground, a rumble shook the entire cavern and caused little particles of dust to rain down onto the large figure resting within it. Surrounding it were walls lined with bookshelves stacked full of every single type and form of writing ever created, from scrolls to books to even stone tablets, they had it all.

The creature opened a single, glowing red eye and stared up at the roof of the cavern, a heavy sigh escaping from beyond its lips.

" _So...he's finally returned…_ "

The giant beast picked its head off the cold hard ground and opened its other eye, turning to look back over its shoulder at a hole in the wall leading out of the cavern. Sitting obediently beneath of the many torches that lit up the exit was a tiny wolf-like creature with eyes that glowed in the darkness and a calm and loveable appearance, and when the large beast fixed its gaze on it the wolf seemed to stand at attention, ready to receive orders.

"Go to him and inform him that I have felt their presence yet again. He must gather those who are strongest and come to meet me." it said, the wolf yapping and nodding its head once before it jogged away.

The beast chuckled to itself before turning to look back at the bookshelves lining the cavern walls, a large scaly hand rising up from the floor and tapping a certain section with a single claw. A second wolf leaped up from the ground and leaped from shelf to shelf, arriving at the specified location a second later and sniffing around from the book the beast wanted until it found it.

It used a paw to pull it loose from its brethren and then gripped it gently with its teeth, turning around and presenting it to the beast afterwards.

"Thank you." said the beast, the wolf returning to its position down on the floor while the dragon gently carried the book over to a reading pedestal elevated high up on the wall in a clear portion devoid of bookshelves, turning it open and closing an eye to begin reading the tiny scriptures written on its pages thanks to its highly, highly acute vision.

" _This will definitely prove to be troublesome…_ "


	54. Hostile Takeover

A/N Sorry for the long upload time guys, had a temporary case of writer's block plus college hit me hard with papers and midterms. Anyways, let's continue. Ahem. Mephistopheles, that is such an awesome-sounding name, definitely fitting for this new character. Speaking of Mephisto, what exactly does he plan on doing with Hikari and the four other Danger Beasts, Gigardos, Skessa, Xelles and Karkatus? The story that he shared with Hikari specifically, I wonder what it was about? That will all be revealed in due time my friends, just stick around and wait for it to come. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 53 - Hostile Takeover**

 **\- The Bastion -**

"Karkatus, you know what to do."

The mole-like Danger Beast screeched its reply to Hikari before it burrowed into the frozen earth just outside the walls of the Bastion, Skessa, Xelles and Gigardos waiting patiently for their orders from the young assassin.

When she finished relaying Mephisto's orders to Gigardos and Skessa, who had covered its wings beneath a shell of solid ice, and watched the two head off together for their set destination, she sighed and crossed her arms across her chest. It had been a few minutes since she had listened to Mephisto's story, which had been a long one at that, and after thinking about it for barely a second she already had made the decision to help him accomplish his goal.

No second thoughts, no doubts. She made this choice completely under her own free will. But there were still parts of his plan that she didn't quite agree with, however she wasn't going to let that get in her way.

 **\- Ten Minutes Earlier -**

"Now that you know of my past and what I experienced, what say you?" said Mephisto after he finished his story and leaned back in his chair.

Hikari could only stare at him with mouth agape and a look of utter shock painted on her face, the influx of history presented to her by the man overwhelming her. "I...um…"

"If you don't want to help me, I won't hold it against you. It's a great undertaking, and I can understand your feelings towards your friends and that girl you spoke of, Lucena."

"No...I want to help." said Hikari, her hands balling up into fists in her lap as she thought more on what Mephisto had said. "I don't want something horrible to happen like what happened to you."

Mephisto looked her over for a moment before he nod his head and got up from his chair, holding out a hand to her so that she may join him. Once she was back on her feet held his hands behind his back and and turned away from her, gazing up toward the ceiling and sighing.

"Very well, the matter has been settled. Moving on, before we can begin, I need to regain some old allies of mine so that we can cover more ground."

"I'm assuming it's _those_ two, right?" asked Hikari.

"Indeed. I know how to bring them back, I've done the same with Gigardos and the others, but in order to do so, you know what I need."

 **\- Present Time -**

" _They'll understand...hopefully._ " she thought with a tinge of worry before she pushed aside the matter and turned to face Xelles, the only remaining Danger Beast.

Despite its appearance that radiated hate and anger, it looked at her with a calm expression with care in its eyes, something one could see in a mother-type figure looking after its young.

"Are you ready?"

Xelles lowered its head down to her level and Hikari took that as its answer, the assassin leaping up and standing in the center of the flame-like patch of fur in between its long ears. She sat down cross-legged and gripped Murasame as the fox-like Danger Beast rose to its full height and began to walk back north, entering the raging snowstorm that hid the Bastion from view and relying solely on its memory to bring them to their destination.

When they finally left the storm behind, which happened near the end of the day because of its size, Xelles approached the edge of a steep cliff overlooking a valley that began the shift from the harsh tundra to the craggy deserts and rocky plains of the Southern Territory, and then beyond that the lush forests and grasslands of the Empire.

Hikari couldn't help but feel apprehensive about going forward with the plan, her mind once again drifting back to what Mephisto would need to bring back the allies he had spoken of from his story.

" _To bring them back, I'm going to need the two individuals whom I sensed still had a residual trace of their existence within them._ "

"Who are they?" she had asked, and what Mephisto had said next was what made her first begin to doubt and worry.

" _The man who wields black fire from the west...and he who was once man turned dragon._ "

 **\- New Kannath, Teppelin, Western Nations -**

 **\- Four Days Later -**

"Hey, Kid, what do you say we head out and get some training in?"

Leonard paused in polishing his boots to glance over at his father across the table they were both sitting at in the latter's home.

"Are you sure that's all you want Old Man? Because if I remember correctly, every time we go out for "training" it turns into a competition to see who'll win." he replied with a snicker, Rafe narrowing his eyes and spitting some tobacco infused saliva into a plastic cup next to him.

"What's wrong with that?"

"Well, considering our record you've won forty eight times and myself sixty four. It's pointless to keep trying Dad, I'm going to win more often then not."

"You barely won last time, _barely_." rebuked Rafe while pointing an accusing finger at Leonard, the younger version of the former Lieutenant Colonel grinning at him. "Let's see you try to win again today. I'm gonna take that attitude of yours and shove it right up your ass."

Leonard flew up from his chair and slammed his palms on the table, glaring into his father's eyes with a competitive flare in his own that matched Rafe's in strength. "You are so on, Old Man."

"Will you two please stop that? I can hardly hear myself think over your bickering." said Fiona when she popped her head into the dining room, a frown on her face that was directed at both of them.

"It's not bickering, it's competitive banter." they both said in almost perfect unison, their reply causing Fiona to roll her eyes and shake her head in disdain.

"What did I ever do to get myself in this situation…"

"You married me, that's how." said Rafe with a grin as he walked over to his wife and kissed her, Leonard faking the gag reflex in response before he slipped on his freshly polished boot.

They left the house soon after with their equipment and travelled to the far outskirts of the city so there would hardly be a chance a civilian could get caught in the crossfire, and once there Rafe grinned at his son and popped all of his knuckles. Leonard glared at his father as he unwrapped the golden chain hanging from his hip and widened his stance a little, the Teigu sparkling in the afternoon sun.

"You know, I haven't told you this yet, but when I defected from the Empire twenty years ago your mother and I did this very same thing." said Rafe when they began to walk in a slow circle, eyeing each other carefully.

"Oh really? What happened?"

"We used our Trump Cards, and your mother beat me with hers. And let me tell you Kid, that is nothing to mess around with. She could've very easily killed me if she hadn't held back. That scar just outside the city was the product of it, if you didn't know."

Leonard paled a little when the blackened scar of earth he remembered seeing a couple of times before and he thought of his mother's Teigu, and that if its Trump Card could do something on that scale when she was holding back...he was afraid to see what she could do at full strength.

Suddenly Rafe stopped walking, Leonard doing the same and staring him down cautiously for what would come next.

"Actually, thinking back to that time...that gives me a great idea." said Rafe before he clapped his palms together and inhaled deeply. "As the Warden of Hell, I command you to open! Gate of Hell!"

Leonard brace himself against the sudden burst of power and wind that exploded out from Rafe, the General laughing when his eyes turned purple with white irises and behind him manifested an obsidian-like disk that possessed a rippling portal made of black fire within it. A single tear of blood rolled down Rafe's left cheek and he raised a single hand, Leonard's eyes widening in shock when a seemingly infinite amount of smaller fire portal appeared in the air as a wall directly behind Rafe.

They reached hundreds of feet into the air, and Leonard got even more worried when from the portals emerged black fire constructs of axes, swords and spears. Rafe moved his raised hand out to the left and from the large portal floating behind him and pulled out a huge cleaver sword made of black fire, its blade easily just as long as his own body if not longer.

"Now let's see if you can beat me with that Teigu of yours!" bellowed Rafe at the top of his lungs, Leonard's grip around the golden chain tightening.

" _Damn, he would use his Trump Card right off the bat…_ " thought Leonard as he glanced quickly at his Teigu, a memory of when he first received it from the Emperor coming back for a fraction of a second.

" _This is a brand new Teigu just made by our scientists. It's given name is Chains of the Avenger: Enkidu. How it's used is entirely up to you._ "

Leonard let go of his apprehension and clenched his jaw muscles, the blood in his veins starting to boil as an adrenaline rush overtook his body and lit a fire inside of him that threatened to consume all.

"Alright, I'll meet you head on!"

They were about to have at one another before, all of a sudden, an ear-piercing screech paralyzed them and caused them both to cover their ears to try and block out the shrill. When it disappeared they both looked to the skies and gasped when a large bird with red and orange feathers swoop flown from above with its talons bared. It flapped its massive wings and the father and son had barely enough time to roll out of the way of the concussive force of wind that punched into the dirt and actually created a decently sized crater.

"Damn, this must be one of those Danger Beasts!" swore Rafe as he redirected the portals up towards the bird and fired off a wave of weapons, the bird screeching and to their shock instantly manifested a storm cloud above them that struck down the weapons with several bolts of lightning.

Leonard then felt some tremors beneath his feet and he glanced down, his instincts telling him to grab his father and move out of the way as quickly as possible. Rafe objected to the sudden yanking of his arm off to the side, but they were quickly put to rest when right where he was standing the dirt erupted and became two pairs of spinning drill-like tusks, the two glaring at Karkatus when it emerged from below and screeched at them.

"Seems we have two of them here with us...one for you, and one for me." said Leonard after he and his father got back to their feet.

"It would seem like that, yes. I'll take the bird, you handle that mole thing. Agreed?"

"Agreed. Let's do this Old Man."

Leonard then darted to the right to draw Karkatus' attention toward him, the Danger Beast turning itself and rushing him with its tusks aimed directly at him. The soldier leaped into the air to avoid the charge and he threw Enkidu's blade out, the dagger sticking itself into the creature's back and stiffening the chain.

"Heavenly Impact!"

Leonard harshly pulled himself back towards Karkatus and smashed his foot into its back, an explosion of golden fire shooting out in all directions on impact, and he half expected to hit the ground a moment later after piercing through its body. However, to his shock, he hardly made a dent in the tough, leathery skin of the Danger Beast, and with a screech Karkatus reared back on its back two legs and flipped itself over in an attempt to smash Leonard into the ground.

He got away just in time and watched Karkatus squirm a little before it managed to roll itself over again and stare at Leonard again. That moment of vulnerability where its underbelly was open gave him an idea on how to defeat the Danger Beast, so instead of all out attacking it again he wrapped up Enkidu around hiss right arm and dared Karkatus to charge again.

Meanwhile Rafe and Gigardos were locked in a fierce stalemate, with either fight unable to land blows on one another due to the later being able to fly and create lightning to shoot down the weapons the former would fire up at it. And when the bird would attempt to strike Rafe with a vicious lightning bolt attack, he would easily dodge them thanks to the black fire horse he created for himself to ride on.

" _Dammit, h_ _e's too high up to reach him from here and his defenses are exemplary._ " he thought with a growl, his analytical mind going at a hundred miles per hour to figure out a way to properly engage Gigardos.

Every other option he thought of was quickly discarded when he realized they wouldn't work, so he resolved to go with the only one he had left, which of course was the crazy option.

" _Here goes nothing!_ "

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

Wave slipped on his favorite jacket and made a move to put on his red scarf, but stopped himself when he remembered for probably the hundredth time that he no longer had it any more. He had given it to his daughter, which led him to think about Hikari and become discouraged about seeing her.

" _Hikari…_ "

He looked up from the dresser in his and Akame's bedroom and glanced for a moment at the window before walking towards the door. Suddenly his body froze up and he darted back to window, looking out to the city scape outside with wide eyes when he realized that they didn't deceive him. Standing across from his home atop a telephone poll from the street was none other then Hikari herself, the slight breeze in the air sending her unusually white hair blowing off towards the right as she stared directly at him.

"H-Hikari?" he asked to himself, his daughter's emotionless look unnerving to him.

Then without warning she leaped away, Wave reacting quickly by opening up the window going after her with determination fueling him. He hardly worried about Akame and what she would think she came home and he wasn't there, she could handle herself, so instead he put all of his efforts into pursuing Hikari.

"Hikari!" he shouted to try and reach her, but she didn't respond and remained adamant in leaving the city.

Wave growled under his breath and he dug deep, activating Grand Chariot's key that had fused with his very heart and donned the armor in order to use its wings to catch up to her. To his surprise she somehow managed to stay ahead of him throughout the entire chase, only stopping when they had reached a good distance away from the wall of the Imperial Capital and deep into the forest surrounding it.

"Hikari, tell me what's going on. Why is your hair white?" he asked, his paternal instincts kicking in as his wings folded up and his helmet's face plates pulled back to reveal his face. "What happened to you?"

She dropped her shoulders and Wave stiffened when he saw her remove Murasame from her side and withdraw the sword from its sheath, her head slowly turning around so that she could glance back at her father with a look of regret.

"Dad...I'm sorry…"

Wave didn't know what she meant before the ground suddenly rumbled and he gasped when the trees behind her were suddenly uprooted, revealing Xelles with its eyes blazing with unrivaled fury and its razor-sharp teeth bared like it was ready to strike. He barely had enough time to leap back when it reared one of its hands back and smashed it into the ground where he had been standing just moments before.

Then Hikari was immediately on his right and she threw her fist into his jaw, blurring his vision and very nearly knocking him out from just the force alone of her strength-enhanced punch. She kept the string going with a vicious kick to his ribcage and then a following kick to the bottom of his jaw, throwing him up into the air and directly in front of Xelles' face.

It reached up and wrapped its clawed fingers around Wave, squeezing exceptionally tight and causing him to let out a painful cry. He glared at Xelles and snarled heavily, his armor starting to groan and creak as his anger began to run unchecked through his system and respond to his desire to defeat the enemy before him.

"You dare think you can **beat me?!** " demanded Wave when he began to transform and lose his human form, his body growing and malforming into that of his real self within Xelles' grasp.

He got so big and heavy that the fox had to let go and retreat with Hikari back a few meters to wait for Wave to finish transforming into his dragon body and let out a deafening roar that shook the very heavens themselves.

" _Dad…_ " thought Hikari as he slammed his hands down into the earth and stared angrily at Xelles, who returned the gesture in kind with a roar of its own.

The two Danger Beasts stared at one another for a fraction of a second before Wave unfurled his wings and leapt at Xelles with a fist cocked back and fire lacing his lips. He missed the punch when Xelles sidestepped him, and it used its nine tails to block the stream of fire Wave unleashed upon it. Wave pressed his advantage and grasped one of its tails tightly, using all his mighty strength being the incarnation of Tyrant himself to throw the fox up into the air several hundred meters.

He then flew up after it and landed a devastating blow into its gut with his fist and then lighting up its body with an even bigger stream of fire. To finish off the brutal attack, Wave flapped hings and brought both hands up before smashing both of them down into his enemy's back, breaking almost all of its vertebrae and devastating its nervous system all the hell to the point when Xelles crashed back into the ground there was no chance of it getting back up again.

" **Hikari, come here. We need to talk.** " growled Wave in a low tone as he turned his head to stare at his daughter, who was standing at the top of a nearby tree.

"I'm sorry Dad, but I can't do that. There's something that I need to do first." she replied, Wave raising an eyebrow in confusion.

Unfortunately for him he didn't even notice Xelles miraculously recover from the crippling injuries it had sustained and raise an arm up towards the back of his head. Without warning it grabbed Wave by the face and wrenched his head back, allowing it to bring around its other hand and chop Wave's throat heavily, cutting off his airwaves to make it incredibly hard for him to breath. As he coughed and hacked Xelles roared as flames sprouted to life from its very body and launched out at him, weakening the dragon further and further until the fox could deliver the final knockout the punch that did just that.

Wave collapsed to the ground totally unconscious, Hikari looking down at her father and sighing heavily before she nod her head at Xelles, the fox losing the angry expression and reached down to grab both of his arms to start dragging him away before anyone could interrupt them.

 **\- New Kannath Outskirts, Teppelin, Western Nations -**

"Take that you wretched thing!" roared Rafe as he slammed his foot into the cheek of Gigardos and then unleashed a barrage of black fire weapons onto the bird, their blades piercing its skin and lighting it ablaze.

This was the third time he had landed a meaningful blow on the bird after he had used the technique Authority of the Gods to teleport himself into the air to meet it head on, but just like before, through some means he could only recognize as the same circumstances seen with a user of Devil's Heart, the bird would heal itself almost instantly and return to shooting off massive storms of lightning at him.

Down on the ground the fight between Leonard and Karkatus was also stuck in an endless stalemate, where the former was proving his method of flipping the mole-like Danger Beast on its back so that he may devastate its less-protected belly with Enkidu, but after every time he would the creature would just bury itself into the ground and re-emerge without a scratch on it. To be honest it was beginning to irritate him greatly as well as his father to the point they were just ruthlessly hammering away at the Danger Beasts in the hopes they would eventually kill them through sheer force.

"Dad, this is getting us nowhere!" shouted Leonard up to Rafe, who growled his response after absorbing another lightning bolt from Gigardos.

"I've kind of already noticed that! This is pissing me off!" he snarled, Gigardos cawing at him once before it suddenly took to the skies and vanished behind the storm clouds it had created and did not return.

At the same time Karkatus did the same maneuver by digging deep into the earth with its drill tusks and disappeared without a trace, leaving the two soldiers absolutely dumbfounded as to why they would just suddenly leave in the middle of their fight. Rafe was about to follow Gigardos upwards until he felt a new, entirely different presence appear in te sky with him, and before he could react a stream of blue struck his body and froze him within a block of ice in an instant.

"Dad!" bellowed Leonard as he watched his father drop out of the air like a stone and get caught by Gigardos, the bird cawing one final time just as a third Danger Beast he recognized as the one Selena and Lucena had fought in the north emerged with its wings completely unfurled.

Skessa fixed the gaze of all three of its heads on Leonard and reared back, lunging forward afterwards to fire off a massive stream of ice that covered the landscape and Leonard beneath an immensely heavy and thick sheet of ice that would make it difficult for even Enkidu to melt through.

With their package secured within ice the three Danger Beasts quickly left the area to return to the Bastion and meet their allies and Mephisto, who would be waiting patiently for them.

 **\- The Bastion, Far South -**

After another four days passed by of nonstop travelling, Hikari and Xelles, with the still unconscious Wave, arrived at the frozen fortress through the snowstorm and met Gigardos, Skess and Karkatus out in front. Hikari hopped off of Xelles and set down Wave, who during their journey had woken up and through talking with her was able to calm down and return to his human form long enough for her to knock him out again. Gigardos did the same with the frozen Rafe then waited with her and the others for Mephisto to come out and greet them.

"Welcome back. And well done Hikari. I know it must've been difficult, and I commend you for your efforts." said the man after placing a hand on Hikari's shoulder to comfort her, the assassin nodding before she glanced at Rafe and Wave.

"So...what are you going to do with them exactly?" she asked.

Mephisto approached Rafe first and tapped once on the ice, breaking it almost instantly and freeing the General from its confines so that he may begin.

"What's the meaning of this?!" he sputtered angrily, but before he could do anything Mephisto put one hand on his chest directly above his heart and the other a few inches away from his forehead, index finger extended.

"Old friend...it's time for you to return."

Rafe's entire body suddenly lost all rigidity when Mephisto touched the tip of his finger to his forehead and punctured the skin ever so slightly, Hikari watching in silence when a long drawn out breath escaped his lips. Then Rafe's eyes widened ever-so-slightly and he grunted, the red color draining away to a blank white while his sclerae turned dark purple when he began to undergo a transformation Hikari had never seen before.

Mephisto stepped back from Rafe and he motioned to her to step back with him, the two retreating a ways to give enough room for whatever was going to happen to next. Rafe collapsed to his knees and hunched over, grunts and growls starting to emerge from beyond his lips as his back began to bulge a shift like something was trying to break free. Hikari gasped when black fire came to life around him in response to this morphing, and then all of a sudden Rafe let out a yell when something large and covered with red fur exploded from his body and stretched high into the sky.

His body was lost within the thing, whatever it was, as it grew and changed its shape to gain four legs with paws instead of hands or feet. Taller it grew until a tail spurted from its backside, and then where its neck was supposed to be grew a head reminiscent of a dog's. Even then it wasn't finished and with a sickening noise reminiscent of flesh being severed the head split itself into the three, turning it into a cerberus-like creature with blood red-fur.

Hikari stared up at the creature with wide eyes when it let out a breath from all three of its heads and opened its pale-white eyes, the cerberus looking around for a few moments before it stared at them and immediately recognized Mephisto.

"Mephistopheles…? What is the meaning of this?"

"Garmr, come down here immediately." ordered Mephisto sternly, the dog immediately responding by shrinking itself down and turning into a human male wearing a black and red cloak with an large cuff unbuttoned down to the waist.

His hair was also blood-red just as well as his beard, and when the transformation was completed he walked over to Mephisto and bowed like a loyal subordinate would do to its master.

"Don't spare me with your flattery, swine. Get inside and await for me in there. We have much to discuss once I am done out here."

"But of course, Lord Mephistopheles." replied Garmr before he swiftly turned and walked into the Bastion without a second thought.

Mephisto then turned to Wave and saw that he had actually woken up and had seen the entire ordeal, but instead of trying to escape he had stayed where he was. He looked up at Hikari and stood up, his eyes never leaving hers while the frown on his face remained present and his arms crossed themselves over his chest.

"Hikari, please, all I ask is that you explain to me what the hell just happened. _Right_ now."

"Allow me."

Mephisto stepped forward and began to talk with Wave, telling him of everything that he had divulged onto Hikari as soon as he had been revived, and once he was finished Wave was left totally awestruck. He turned to Hikari to make double-sure what he had heard was true, and when she nod her head he returned his gaze to Mephisto and sighed.

"I see…"

Without another word he lowered his arms and remained still, Mephisto thanking him before he performed the same technique on him as he did to Rafe and pressed the tip of his index finger into his forehead. Wave collapsed to his knees and Hikari had to actually look away so that she didn't watch her father transform into a dragon, however it wasn't his usual self. The scales morphed from the dark navy blue to the maroon seen on Tyrant when he was alive, and the scales and horns began to reposition themselves into a new formation that made what he was turning into definitely different then Tyrant.

The biggest difference was that whatever he was turning into was definitely larger then Tyrant, and that Wave was now gone, replaced by the consciousness of an entirely new being from and age long ago. The dragon roared and slammed its hands into the snowy earth, relaxing a moment later to sit on its hind legs and stare at the people who had brought it back to life from death itself.

" **Mephistopheles...old friend, it's good to see you again.** "

"Indeed it is, Rex Tyrannos. It's a pleasure to see you again." said Mephisto warmly before he motioned with an arm towards the Bastion. "Walk around to the throne room on the other side so that we may talk, Garmr is waiting for us there. A _lot_ of things have changed since we've been gone."


	55. The Storm's Arrival

A/N Oh what fun, there goes Rafe and Wave into whatever those two new guys are. And we still don't know what Mephisto's relationship is with them, and what his past enabled him and Hikari to actually CONVINCE Wave to do what he did. Oh yeah, and then there's also that situation with So many unanswered questions, I LOVE IT. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 54 - The Storm's Arrival**

" **So, Mephisto, what is the meaning behind our revival? I was content with my passing.** "

"Yes, well, I'm glad I'm alive again so that I can continue where I left off before I was killed by that bitch."

Mephisto crossed his arms over and looked from Garmr standing across from him to the head of Rex Tyrannos peering into the throne room through the hole in the ceiling above. Each had a look of anticipation and intrigue on their faces that told him they were hungry for information, so he cleared his throat and brought Hikari to his side so that she may help if the need came about.

"My old comrades in arms, I've brought you back to help me yet again in accomplishing my goals, only the goal I have now is very much different then the one I had back then." he began, the two Danger Beasts staring at the armored man as he paced back and forth.

"Of course, this shall prove difficult for even us due to the fact that now, the world is a very different place. Humans control large swaths of territory and hold enormous armies equipped with well-trained soldiers and powerful weapons known as Teigu. I myself know this for a fact because my heart was turned into one, as well as your flames, Garmr, and...your son, Rex."

Rex Tyrannos widened his eyes in shock at Mephisto and he bared his teeth in anger, his rage bubbling up from within and overwhelming as a result of learning about his son.

" **He was killed and turned into some _weapon_? I'll make those rotten meat sacks pay…** "

"No, you will not." ordered Mephisto darkly with a hiss like that of a snake's, his killer intent silencing Rex Tyrannos. "And if you'll stay quiet for a moment, I wasn't finished."

The dragon growled deep from within its throat and huffed, calming down enough to listen while Garmr merely snickered at him and put all of his weight onto one foot. He caught a glimpse at Hikari and winked at her with a grin, the assassin glared at him with enough intensity she could've burned holes through his head if it were possible.

"Yes, your son was killed and turned into actually *three weapons, a series of armors that are exceptionally powerful. However because of his incomparable life force he was able to live on within each and has remained alive, especially within the first armor set made from his flesh." explained Mephisto to soothe the tense nerves of Rex Tyrannos.o

Despite this fact alone the large dragon remained somewhat angry, but he spoke no more about making humanity pay and motioned for the armored man to continue talking to them both about the state of the world today.

"Moving forward, considering my rebirth thanks to Hikari here, there's no doubt that _he_ sensed my presence as well as yours."

"He? You mean _that_ he?" questioned Garmr with a look of bafflement, Mephisto nodding slowly. "Well, it's not like that pacifist is gonna do anything."

"You do not know who you are speaking of, Garmr. I know more about him then you could possibly imagine. If we are to accomplish my goal, we need to act quickly, so instead to waiting her any longer, I'll tell the rest to you both as we make our way north. Let us make haste."

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

 **\- Four Days Later -**

"With Wave and Raphael gone, this can only spell even worse events to come! We must prepare ourselves for war against these damned Danger Beasts!" said Solomon to Arthur through the speakers provided on the television set-up sitting before him.

Joining him at his side was Camilla, and broadcasting through two other TVs on either side of theirs were the newly elected leader of the Northern Nation, which was recently created thanks to the unification of the tribes, and the Chairman from the Western Nations with Leonard at Fiona right there next to him from his office.

Standing with Arthur in the throne room was pretty much everyone who were friends with Wave, starting with Tatsumi, Esdeath, Akame of course, Lubbock, Leone, and Maya on his right. The left side consisted of his Generals, Lucena, Selena, Juno, and all three sisters had a disgruntled look that matched their parents and their friends while Arthur could only rub his visible temples in frustration.

"Yes, I know Solomon, but if we just start preparing for war with an enemy that we have no information about whatsoever, the people will worry and there will be chaos!" rebuked the Emperor, Solomon crossing his arms and growling something under his breath.

"Either way, we can no longer push these Danger Beasts off to the side. They are a threat that needs to be dealt with, and there's still the problem of young Hikari." stated the Northern Nation's leader.

A murmur of agreement resonated from all of the world leaders, so Arthur looked over to his military leaders and stared directly at Lucena personally, the Great General meeting his gaze and waiting silently for his words.

"Lucena, all of our armies are currently battle ready, correct?" he asked.

"Yes, sir, they are. What are you thinking?"

Before Arthur could answer her, the Chairman gasped when his office back in the Parliamentary Building in New Kannath suddenly shook. He told Leonard to check and see what could cause such a commotion, and Arthur asked what was happening as a grim feeling of despair took hold on his heart.

"Yes, everything is f-"

Leonard then cut him off as he flew back into the room, Enkidu in his grasp. "We need to get you out of here, _now_."

"What's going on?" asked Arthur while Fiona quickly escorted the Chairman away off the TV screen to somewhere else in his office. "

"We've just spotted another new Danger Beast heading our way, it's one that's totally different then the ones we've seen. It's some sort of three headed dog!"

With that they all heard an ear-piercing roar come from their side of the connection, and then suddenly the entire screen just went black when they were cut off from one another. Not even a minute passed by before both Solomon and Camilla were met by their son who frantically told them that all four of the unknown Danger Beasts they had each encountered were just spotted coming onto the coast.

"Sorry, but we have to cut this meeting short." apologized Camilla with a frown before they too disappeared, leaving Arthur in a state of worry and confusion for their friends.

Then the whole entire Imperial Palace shook through its very rafters down to the foundation when a deafening roar louder then anything they had ever heard before echoed out across the capital. A noxious aura drifted through the very cracks of the palace itself and paralyzed everyone present in the throne room, but what made it worse was Tyrant, upon feeling it, immediately gasped.

" _Tyrant? You okay?_ " she asked for not only her but Alzora as well.

" ** _I...I can't believe it…_** "

" _Believe what? Do you know what made that roar?_ " questioned Alzora.

Before the dragon could respond they were all silenced by another roar that grabbed their attention and forced them to listen to the equally terrifying deep, guttural voice that came afterwards.

" **Hear me now, humans! My given name is Rex Tyrannos, the King of Beasts, the Bane of Humankind, and I have come bearing a message to those who are the strongest warriors among you. I challenge you to a duel, your strongest warrior against myself! If he is victorious, I will leave without another word, but if _I_ win, you will all surrender yourself to me at once! If you fail to approach me within the next thirty minutes, I will lay waste to this city!** "

When the voice stopped speaking, everyone in the throne room was left utterly speechless. Slowly they all began to turn towards Lucena, and she could only give them a shrug because she too had no idea what was going on.

"Rex Tyrannos…? Is he somehow...related to Tyrant?" asked Lubbock with a glance at Tatsumi, since he had spent the most time with the dragon before Lucena.

"I...I don't know." he replied. "Lucena?"

She nod her head and consulted the dragon within her thoughts, her facial expressions that resulted from what he was telling her their only clue as to just how much of a shocking revelation it would lead them to have if they heard. She gulped and shifted her stance ever-so-slightly, which must've meant Tyrant had finished speaking, and she looked at everyone with a grim expression.

"Yes, he is. Tyrant said that, um...it's his father."

"Tyrant's _father_?!" exclaimed practically everyone in the room.

Then as if that wasn't a surprise on its own the throne room doors were flung inward and in walked Kaminari with a frown on his face and a look in his eyes that spoke he meant business.

"Indeed, Rex Tyrannos is Tyrant's father, but right now we do not have the time to discuss these matters. Someone will need to go out there and fight that dragon while the rest of you need to come with me."

"Come with you? To where?"

"Someone who can explain to us everything that's going on.

Arthur, who up until now had silently been debating with himself over what to do and how to handle the precarious situation the Imperial Capital was in currently. Then he looked down at his own two hands and closed them, his eyes shutting as he exhaled deeply and lowered his arms.

"I'll do it." he said, his gaze moving from one person to the next. "I will go and face this dragon."

Immediately, just like he expected, Maya was the first person to object heavily too this claim and instead offered herself to take his spot. He shushed her softly by raising up a single hand to her mouth and chuckled, saying, "Maya, I thank you for you concern, but it is my duty as the Emperor to protect the people. All of you need to leave with Kaminari while I cover your escape."

"Arthur, please. What will we do if you die?" asked Juno, but the Emperor was adamant in his decision and waved her aside.

"I will not spend precious time arguing with you over this. Go, I'll be fine. I've lived for this long, and I will continue to live until the Empire finds another new Emperor to take my spot."

Esdeath was about to say something alongside Juno but she was stopped by Tatsumi resting a hand on he shoulder and shaking his head, silently telling her there was no use. Kaminari waited for them today their goodbyes before he led them out of the throne room with a contingent of Imperial Guards that Lucena called to their side.

Arthur waited until their footsteps totally vanished before he turned away from the door and walked up the steps of the throne to the chair itself, grabbed his long sword that was leaning against one side of it, and then stared up to the ceiling. He steeled himself for the coming fight and made his way through the palace up to the roof balcony, the Emperor stepping out into the sunlight and narrowing his eyes at the sudden change in brightness.

Once his eyesight adjusted his truly got a sense for how mighty the dragoon threatening the capital's safety was when he laid his eyes upon him from the tallest point in the city. Rex Tyrannos was a large dragon, most definitely larger then Tyrant or Wave when in his dragon form, and like his son he had pitch black scales with some dark maroon mixed in, large horns jutting out from his head and a mouth filled with razor-sharp teeth.

He possessed a muscular build reminiscent of a human's, and folded up on his back were his large leathery wings, and he discovered that he also had two pairs of eyes just like Tyrant that glowed somewhat with a savage yet controlled brand of rage that Arthur had never seen before in his life from anything.

" _So...this is Tyrant's father...to think that a Danger Beast could grow this large…_ " thought Arthur before he closed the door to the roof balcony and gripped his sword tightly.

Rex Tyrannos stared out over the massive city and rested his gaze on the Imperial Palace, his eyes locking onto the lone figure standing at its peak. He watched it closely as it leaped from building to building over to the portion of the wall he stood beyond, and when it came to stand before he lowered his head down to their level in order to get a good look.

" **I see you, warrior. Who might you be?** "

"My name is Arthur Pendragon, Emperor of this land. I will be the one to challenge you, great beast Rex Tyrannos." replied Arthur proudly, the dragon's eyes widening a fraction of an inch.

He was impressed by the man's attitude and pride in one's self and his title, and the added touch with him being called "great beast" as if he were a acquaintance instead of an enemy. He could also sense that this Emperor was definitely a very strong individual, one that separated itself from everyone else within the city, however he wasn't the _strongest_.

" **I thank you for approaching me to defend your city, but you are not the strongest fighter here. I can tell...there is someone far stronger out there. Why is that?** "

"I may not be the strongest, but I cannot sit idly by as the Emperor and watch my people be threatened. _I_ will be your opponent, and if I die, then so be it, I would rather myself be killed then one of my citizens or friends."

Rex Tyrannos understood and bowed his head out of respect for Arthur, his head rising back up to its previous height when he moved away from the wall and unfurled his wings in anticipation of battle. Arthur watched closely as the dragon's muscles began to ripple and tiny flames started to flutter out from behind his teeth, and he couldn't help but get excited on the inside at the chance of fighting not just another dragon but the _father_ of Tyrant himself, who was reputed to be one of the strongest, if not _the_ strongest of all Danger Beasts.

" **I admire your conviction, Emperor…** " began Rex Tyrannos when he spread his wings as far out as possible and stood up partially on his hind legs, his large body form almost blocking out the sun. " **Very well, I accept this change in terms! Show me your strength, Emperor!** "

Rex Tyrannos returned to standing on all four legs and glared at Arthur in utter silence as the man gripped his sword with both hands and lowered his head, a faint yellow light beginning to emanate from the contact one with the blade's hilt and his fingers. He knew that waiting to use his Trump Card would prove to be a bad mistake, he needed to go full power right from the get-go to ensure the safety of the Empire.

Even Rex Tyrannos could sense the change in demeanor of the Emperor, and when he noticed the light grow brighter he prepared himself for what was to come. Then, through the dead silence dominating the area, Arthur began to chant.

"Bestow unto me thy divine and righteous power...the power to destroy the darkness and make way for the light!"

Suddenly he thrust his sword skywards and with a flash of white light he declared to the very heavens, "Holy Seal Unleashed - Caliburnus!"

Rex Tyrannos shielded his eyes with a hand when a humongous shockwave struck his body and actually managed to push him back a couple of feet, the blinding light making it hard to see what was becoming of his opponent. From what he could tell, Arthur had been consumed by a pillar of yellow light that stretched miles high into the sky and expunged any and all shadows in the immediate area, and he could just barely make out the Emperor himself levitating through it into the air.

Then, as soon as it had manifested upon the announcing of the technique's name, it faded away and revealed the transformed Arthur to the dragon. His golden body glowed with the purest of auras and the white wings sprouting from his back gave him the appearance of an angel or some divine being that had just blessed the earth upon its entry to the mortal world.

Arthur lifted his longsword with one hand and pointed it at Rex Tyrannos, his eyes now blazing with a power that matched his in ferocity, while uttering a single challenge. "Bring it."

Rex Tyrannos growled before he leaped into the air and propelled himself with his large wings hundreds of feet above the ground, Arthur giving chase with his sword at his side and conviction in his heart. He swung once at the dragon and he surprisingly dodged it, showcasing the agility he possessed despite his large size and blew a stream of fire as a counterattack.

Arthur raised his free hand up and deflected the flames with a shield made of pure energy, and once they were gone he was assaulted by the spiked tail of Rex Tyrannos that shattered through the shield and barreled into his body with the force of a landslide. He righted himself after tumbling back erratically for a few seconds and charged Rex Tyrannos once again, ducking and weaving through the fire he launched at him until he was close enough to dive under a swipe and lunge at the dragon's chest. His sword flew straight and true as he pierced through the toughened scales protecting the dragon, but instead of plowing through like a bullet the blade stopped mere inches from the surface and ceased moving any more.

Rex Tyrannos batted away Arthur like a mere fly and chuckled, which caused the Emperor to curse under his breath and the dismissal of the attack like it was nothing.

" **In my lifetime I've experienced many a battle and fought with tooth and claw against the most powerful of my kind, only ever being bested once by one. My body has toughened itself to the point where hardly anything can pierce through it, so I commend you for actually being able to cut through my scales.** "

"Well, I am honored then. But if you think that this is the extent of my power, you are sorely mistaken!" bellowed Arthur when in response he increased his power two-fold, catching Rex Tyrannos off guard.

He made a quick glance over his shoulder back down at the Imperial Capital and hoped that he had provided a good enough distraction for Kaminari to lead his friends out of the city.

"Have at thee!"

 **\- Cinigraed, Kingdom of Straelka -**

"Why won't these things just _die_?!" snarled Morgan when he cleaved Xelles in half for about the third time in a row with the immensely powerful Mountain Cutter, but despite the technique the fox-like Danger Beast merely fused itself back together again like nothing had ever happened.

"We can't let them reach the city!" yelled Camilla at the top of her lungs as she and Solomon avoided another ice blast from Skessa.

She looked to the skies and still saw Gigardos soaring overhead, its very presence alone the only factor that kept their airships from lifting off and joining the fight. Her attention returned to the ground when Karkatus emerged from blow and charged straight at her. It never even got close when the blood red tentacles emerging from her back wrapped around the tusks of the Danger Beast and flung it over her head onto its back.

" _God, I still find this creepy…_ " she thought with a cheesy smile when the blood tentacles let go of them and impaled the creature several times over through its stomach.

How she got around to becoming a user of Vile Blood Curse was actually quite scary, since it basically saved her life. Around the time she had given her Teigu to Morgan when he had gotten old enough to begin training with it, she had fallen deathly ill with an entirely new disease the kingdom had never encountered before. It was a new form of cancer that afflicted her heart to make it slowly swell up until it would eventually burst and kill her.

Thankfully, Solomon had offered to partake in a heart transplant in which his heart, which would grow back afterwards, would replace Camilla's in order to save her life. The operation was tedious and stressful beyond belief, with both Solomon and Morgan fearing for her life and praying to god that she would make it through, and after several hours it proved to be a success and more. Not only was her life saved by the crucial operation, but as a result of receiving Solomon's heart, which was the "holder" essentially for Vile Blood Curse after he had first ingested the Phoenix blood, she too became a user of the Teigu when the blood still contained within it fused with her and drastically multiplied to the point she recovered in a matter of minutes.

"Hey, Camilla, how does it feel?"

She was drawn out of her thoughts by her husband, who had appeared at her sign with a somewhat concerned look on his face. "What, these? It feels weird, but there's no problems."

"Good. And yeah, it does take some time to get used to it." said Solomon with a grin before they stood back to back against Skessa and Karkatus.

As they engaged the hostile Danger Beasts yet again, the capital itself was in the process of evacuating the citizens to underground bunkers built within the volcano the upper city and Royal palace sat upon. And through the commotion, a single figure slipped through the crowds and made their way towards the defensive wall while keeping their head hung low.

The cloak they wore hid their identity from the people and soldiers they passed by, and once they had walked into a alleyway off the road they leaped up to the city skylines and took the shortcut there. Once they reached the wall and stood atop it, a gust of wind blew back the hood covering their face and revealed the figure to be a male with messy brown hair that had a slight gradation to auburn from the roots to the tips.

He narrowed his eyes and clenched his fists tightly as the battle between the Royal Family and the four Danger Beasts took a turn for the worse. Gigardos had left the skies high above the city and had manifested an enormous lightning storm with the mere flapping of its wings, Solomon and Camilla unable to do anything when the lightning bolts struck them dead-on and zapped them to the point they were knocked unconscious.

Soon after Morgan was knocked out of the air by the bird and then frozen in ice alongside his parents by Skessa, this last act prompting the man to growl and tap the cane in his hand several times on top of the concrete wall.

" _Here we go._ "

He took a few steps back and crouched down slightly, feeling the tension in his knees build until they could hardly be kept back any longer and leaped into the fray with nothing to defend himself but his cane.

Gigardos was about to pick up Solomon and Camilla with its talons before the man suddenly appeared right next to its head and slammed both feet into it, launching it away from the Straelkan rulers with surprising force and catching the other two Danger Beasts completely on guard. As soon as his feet touched solid earth the man propelled himself up again right into the lower jaw of Xelles, his fist wrenching back the fox's neck and throwing it over onto its back as if it were nothing.

"Let us be on our way, you three." said the man with a grin before he used his cane to break the ice trapping Solomon, Camilla and Morgan, hauled the all three over his shoulders and then left the are quickly before the four Danger Beasts could stop him.

They gave up on the idea of chasing after him and when Xelles and Gigardos recovered, they surrounded the capital city and saw that the streets were totally empty and devoid of human life. Skessa reared and with all three heads it circled the outskirts of the city, creating an immensely thick wall of ice that stretched high into the sky before it began to curve up and form into a complete dome.

Now that their job had been completed, Gigardos took to the skies to inform their master to their success while Xelles, Karkatus and Skessa remained at the entrapped capital to guard it against any attacks.

Meanwhile the man who had saved Solomon, Camilla and Morgan had ducked down into a deep canyon a couple of miles away from the capital and took them off his shoulders with care. He took a few moments to catch his breath and then looked to the east, his grin returning again.

" _Time to head home._ "

 **\- New Kannath, Western Nations -**

"Hikari, why would you do something such as this?!" asked Fiona as she clashed blades with Hikari, the young assassin leaping away from her and averting her gaze.

Currently Leonard was in the midst of fighting Garmr head-on with Enkidu, the two opponents so engrossed with one another that there was no chance of them seeing anything else around them.

Even though it appeared to Fiona that Hikari had totally thrown away their friendship and the bonds she had made with all of her friends in order to pursue destruction, in fact Hikari was hurting deep on the inside and she wanted so badly to tell her the truth behind the disappearance of Rafe, but she knew that if she did tell her she would be even angrier.

"You will come to understand in the future, young one."

Fiona whirled around at the new voice and she shivered when Mephisto, who had seemingly appeared from thin air itself, approached her with a fairly large cleaver sword in his right hand. His appearance screamed malicious and evil intent, but from his gaze and body posture alone she found quite surprisingly that he looked like he was hesitant to fight.

However she remained vigilant and stared at Mephisto with a scowl on her face, the armored figure loosening his grip on his sword and motioning for Hikari to join his side.

"What do you mean by that? And just who are you, exactly?"

"My name is Mephistopheles, and I cannot explain to you the reasons behind our appearance fully to you. But know this, I do not intend to harm anyone. I am doing this for the greater good."

"Greater good? That is a lie. Blatantly attacking my home like this...there's nothing good about that!" yelled Fiona when in the background Garmr opened two of its mouths to unleash two fireballs, and Leonard countered by bringing around Enkidu in a wide arc and sliced the projectiles in half.

"I'm sorry, but I can't let you stop me. You'll come to understand eventually." apologized Mephisto regretfully before, in the blink of an eye, he was standing right in front of her after seemingly taking only a single step.

He knocked Kaminari out of her grasp and prepared to place his finger directly against her forehead, his eyes starting to give off a faint glow like he was getting ready to hypnotize her. Before his hand could even get within an inch of her skin the flaming golden chains of Enkidu suddenly wrapped tightly around his body and limbs, Leonard flying in from the side at break-neck speed and ramming his heel into Mephisto's jaw.

Enkidu unraveled itself from him when he rocketed away as a result of the harsh kick, and right in front of Hikari's eyes Leonard stared her down from behind his helmet and then picked up his mother and her Teigu.

"Traitor." he snarled before leaping away to safety, since the city itself had fallen to Garmr and the seemingly endless horde of dog-like Danger Beasts that he had under his control.

When the two of them left the immediate area as Mephisto was recovering, she bit her lip and shuddered heavily when her emotions began to get the best of her and tears began to emerge from the corners of her eyes.

" _Was...was all of this really worth it? Everyone hates me...all of my friends probably think I'm some sort of monster…_ "

She was then pulled out of her thoughts when Mephisto rested a hand on her shoulder and turned her around so that she was facing him, the gaze he was giving her through the slit in his helmet almost instantly comforting her.

"Do not doubt yourself. This is a tough path to walk, and you are a very brave girl for bearing it."

Hikari whimpered and stepped forward into the man's open arms, Mephisto wrapping them gently around her since he was in a suit of armor and hugging her. She began to cry silently, all of the feelings she had bottled up inside of her since she left the Imperial Capital rushing back out like a torrential waterfall that could not be stopped. She thought of her mother, she thought of her friends, but most of all she thought of Lucena and the look of terror and concern she had on her face when she left her behind.

" _L-Lucena...I...I…_ "

 **\- Western Region of the Empire -**

"K-Kaminari...I think we're far enough away to where we can use a more...effective mode of transportation...whew…" muttered Lubbock with a wheeze as he hunched over and took in a deep breath after running for so long.

Lucena, Selena, Tatsumi, Esdeath and the others were equally as tired after pretty much running the entire length away from the capital since if they had tried to use another method such as either Lucena's or Esdeath's ice animal mounts or Kaminari himself if he were to transform back into his Danger Beast form, they would easily be spotted.

"You guys all saw that huge beam of light, right?" asked Leone after recovering herself to a certain extent.

"It was Arthur. He's going full-power against Rex Tyrannos and immediately activated his Trump Card...but I don't think he'll last for long…" said Maya in a low tone.

"What do you mean?" asked Lucena.

Maya rubbed her shoulder and tied the ground anxiously, the group watching her and silently waiting for her to speak. "There's a reason why Arthur seldom uses his Trump Card…"

"Why's that?"

"It's extraordinarily powerful, so much so to the point it could be considered on par with that of the Shikoutazer's beam attacks. However that power is focused across a larger body that can handle the stress and strain of using it. With Arthur, if he uses his Trump Card at full-strength for extended periods of time...his body will begin to break down."

A blanket of dead silence dropped itself over the group like a boulder, some even opening their mouths in shock at the terrible truth. Lucena glanced over at her parents with Selena and they saw each of them had the same expression on their face as they did, as well as Juno, Leone, Akame and Lubbock. Even Kaminari, who normally was never surprised by anything considering how wise he was, had been caught off guard by the predicament.

"So...what your saying is if Arthur fights for too long in his Trump Card state...he could die?" asked Tatsumi, to which Maya nod her head solemnly.

"Don't worry, I'm sure he knows what he's doing. He wouldn't endanger his life like that." said Kaminari with a smile before he motioned with his hand westward. "Now come on, we have a very important meeting to get to."

"With who, if I may ask?" questioned Akame when the Danger Beast transformed back into his original self and laid down so that they may all climb onto his back. When everyone was on he lifted his head up and looked back at them all, a slight twinkle in his eye like he was letting go of a secret no one had ever heard of before.

"He's known by many names, Keeper of Knowledge, Wise One, the list goes on. He's been on this earth far longer then anyone, even Tyrant or Alzora when they were still alive. We, my friends, are going to visit the oldest Danger Beast alive...my mentor."


	56. The Keeper of Knowledge

A/N Hm...well, out of everything that could've gone wrong, this had to happen. Literally everything turned to shit in a matter of what, a couple of days? Sheesh. So much for peace. Anyways guys, it's almost thanksgiving break for me in College, which means I'll have plenty of time to update the wiki with all of these new characters, so when that time comes I will get right on that. Also I hope you guys are finding this second part to be interesting too because to be honest I was really unsure if any of you guys would like it considering it's not early part of the Akame ga Kill storyline and such. I know some people don't like a lot of OCs and such, and there a _lot_ in this story, so that's a factor too. I just wanted to ask because the view counter isn't as high as it was during tthe first part and there has been a drop in reviews, so its got me worried. Thanks fr your understanding. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 55 - The Keeper of Knowledge**

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

 **\- Five Days Later -**

The Empire's citizens within the Imperial Capital, albeit being in one of the most dangerous places on the continent right now, had been bedazzled and awed by the spectacle that for several days now had been occurring just outside their walls. To think that such a feat was possible was mind boggling, but there it was, happening before their very eyes, and the only thing they could do was just watch and or listen to the sounds of battle.

For five days straight since they first began their duel, Arthur and Rex Tyrannos had been at each other's throats with every bit of intensity they could muster up from within one another. The barren land outside the capital's walls that had not regrown the forest once dominating that area before had been turned into a scarred battlefield as a result of the dragon's fire and the Emperor's techniques. The fighters themselves had also changed with Rex Tyrannos, even after boasting the fact that his scales and skin were nigh-impenetrable, was breathing heavily from exhaustion and had sustained some wounds from Arthur when the Emperor had boosted his power yet again to actually be able to reach the softer flesh behind his armor.

Various cuts were present across his body and his blood was dripping out from the gashes and flowing down his scales and skin, something he had not experienced in a very, *very long time. Arthur on the other hand was also on the verge of total body failure, his breaths ragged and forced, and the glow resonating from his Trump Card form flickering every-so-often after using it nonstop for five days.

" _Dammit...It's...it's happening…_ " he thought to himself when he glanced down at his free hand and saw that despite his healing factor, the fingers and entire hand turned black and disintegrated into ash. " _I can't keep this up for any longer…_ "

Rex Tyrannos roared as he reared back with a hand and swiped at Arthur in his moment of rest, the Emperor grunting when he brought his sword up and took the full-force of the blow. His body was instantly racked with pain and even more of his left arm turned to ash, the dragon noticing this and halting momentarily.

" **In all my years of life on the face of this planet, I have never encountered a more determined individual then yourself. Not even my old adversary can compare to you, Emperor.** "

"T-Thank you…" replied Arthur weakly after recovering from the heavy blow, the golden light around him dimming a little more.

" **But I can see that your body is start to degrade to nothing but ash. It is over, surrender now.** "

Rex Tyrannos was caught off guard when another surge of power exploded out from within Arthur and pushed him back several meters, the Emperor glaring at him despite the entirety of his left arm disintegrating as a result. Rex Tyrannos was shocked that this man, who was on the verge of death itself, still possessed such an reserve of strength that no ordinary human being could possible have.

Then he noticed that glare in his eyes and he gasped at the similarity to someone he remembered seeing long ago, and he couldn't help but grin. " **Now isn't this a surprise...to think he would have a descendant…** "

"What are you talking about?" asked Arthur suspiciously.

Rex Tyrannos didn't answer him and instead blew a large stream of fire at the Emperor, his wings flapping soon after to add some extra strength behind the attack that enlarged it five times its original size. When it consumed Arthur and force him to shield himself against the flames, Rex Tyrannos seized the opportunity and rushed his opponent on all fours, coming to a stop when he got close enough and spinning around to use his tail as a mace that slammed into Arthur's side and knocked him down into the earth in the blink of an eye.

When he tried to get up the dragon smashed his fist into his body and crushed it flat, causing him to cry out in agonizing pain when he felt everything from his upper chest and below lose all feeling to him whatsoever. He had not the strength to pry himself free out from underneath Rex Tyrannos' fist, that single blow alone had negated his Trump Card form and had ended his fight. Rex Tyrannos then lifted his fist up off of Arthur and let out a heavy breath, the dragon's gaze fixed solely on his fallen opponent.

" **Emperor...you have fought with courage and strength that is rarely seen with anyone. Tell me...what was your name again?** "

Arthur coughed a little as more of his body began to crumble and turn to ash, his feet and shins going first alongside his right hand and forearm. "I-It's Arthur...Arthur Pendragon…"

Rex Tyrannos nod his head once and closed his eyes when he locked the name away in his memories so that he could remember it for as long as he remained alive, and when that was done he reached down and carefully scooped up what remained of Arthur and turned towards the capital.

" **Arthur Pendragon, Emperor of this land, as thanks and out of respect for the bravery you have shown, I will show mercy and not end your life. However, I will still maintain dominion over this city as per my orders from my superior.** " stated Rex Tyrannos to Arthur, who was slowly fading away into a state of unconsciousness. " **But I promise you this, no harm shall come to your people. I swear it.** "

 **\- Tyrann Mountain Range, Far West -**

Moral among those who had escaped with Kaminari from the Imperial Capital was at an all time low, especially since after they had arrived within the Western Nations they soon found Fiona and Leonard, who told them of the capital's fall to Danger Beasts led by a three-headed dog, a man in maroon armor, and Hikari herself.

They were all hurt, angry, and frustrated, but they all knew that Lucena was hurting the most out of everyone since she was the one to see Hikari first when she had taken Devil's Heart. Right now, while they were resting at some foothills leading up into the Tyrann Mountains farther south from the capital, she was off on her own sitting on the ground with her knees tucked up into her chest.

Tatsumi and Esdeath wanted to comfort her, but Selena and Juno beat them to the punch and walked over to her before they could and sat down next to her. The later rested a hand gently on her shoulder and Lucena looked at both of them, a small smile appearing soon after when Selena wiped away her tears and hugged her.

"Don't worry Sis, everything will turn out okay. We'll find Hikari and find out the truth, okay?"

"Yeah, you don't have anything to worry about." added on Juno with a wink, Lucena sniffing and nodding her head once.

"Thanks. I love you guys." said Lucena as she wrapped an arm around both of her sisters and hugged them, Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya all smiling from where they stood a few feet away.

A few minutes passed by and they all gathered around in a group to talk for a few minutes before Kaminari would take them up and over the mountains to wherever their destination lied...and where this "mentor" he spoke of was.

"So...if New Kannath and the rest of the Western Nations have fallen...the Kingdom of Straelka could have as well." murmured Tatsumi in a low tone to break the ice.

"It's terrible to think so, but there is a very good chance that it happened. Since Tyrant's father attacked the Imperial Capital and Hikari with some company attacked New Kannath, it's entirely possible that those four unknown Danger Beasts attacked Cinigraed." replied Kaminari with an equally low voice, his answer making him growl under his breath in frustration. "But now that we've had rest, it's time to move on once again. I cannot keep my mentor waiting for too long."

With that Kaminari transformed into his dragon form and waitesd for everyone to climb on before he took to the skies and soared over the first few mountains part of the Tyrann Mountain range. They had never explored this part of the range so all of this was an entirely new experience for them, and to be honest they thought that one of those very same mountains below would be the home for this "mentor".

However that soon proved not to be the case when Kaminari flew straight past them and towards something never seen before by human eyes. Lying past the mountain range was a desert with utterly white sand that sparkled from the setting sun's rays striking its surface. What they were more astounded by was directly in the center of the large desert was a domineering tower structure that stretched at least half a mile high into the sky.

"There it is. That's where we'll be meeting him, well, the entrance to where we'll meet him, that is." informed Kaminari as he dropped his altitude a bit and aimed for the large windows cut out at the tower's peak.

"Why hasn't this never been discovered by anyone?" asked Lucena.

"This isn't what this place normally looks like. That desert down there actually isn't made up of sand, it's all glass, because usually this whole area is always covered by storm clouds that continuously rain down lightning bolts, and over time all of the sand turned to glass. It's cleared up now because he knows we are here, so we shouldn't keep him waiting."

Everyone remained silent when Kaminari slowed himself down and easily moved past the window frame and down through the tower towards a faint light below. They didn't know how far down they had gone until Kaminari emerged from the tower into a sight that totally blew them away.

Stretching out from where they were for what seemed like an eternity were bookshelves lined with all sorts of books, scrolls, even stone tablets that predated writing itself. Torches lined a portion of a wall every so often, and regardless of which aisle they looked down from the center of the massive library they could see no end.

What made it even more mind boggling was when Lubbock leaned over a little to look below them and gasped when he discovered there were many more levels beneath the one they had arrived at, stretching down into the dark abyss below forever.

"W-What is this place…?" he asked somewhat nervously, Kaminari directing them all to step off onto a nearby set of bridges organized in a cross fashion that connected the four sides of the library that diverged out from the center together.

"This, my friends, is a library that contains a record of every single bit of knowledge of every event ever recorded in the history of mankind and the before time. This information has been gathered over hundreds of thousands of years...anything you would want to know can be found here." explained Kaminari as he transformed into his human appearance.

"You could spend an eternity here…" muttered Juno in awe.

"I wouldn't recommend it. One would need an innumerable amount of lifetimes in order to read everything stored within this library." said Kaminari before he motioned with a hand down towards the abyss below them. "My mentor is located in the innermost sanctum of the library below us. I'm a little tired from the journey here, so if either Esdeath or Lucena could do the honors, I would very much appreciate it."

Lucena stepped forward and created several ice platform underneath everyone's feet and pieces of ice around her ankles and wrists in order to carry them up and over the edge toward the invisible bottom of the library.

Slowly they descended past each level, which just like the first one had a series of bridges that connected each portion to one another, and were surprised yet again to find that scurrying around between some of the aisles and bookshelves were wolf-like creatures with glowing eyes. Leone asked Kaminari what they were and he told them they were servants of his mentor, the Danger Beasts acting as catalogers that would venture out to the world and retrieve new pieces of information to add to the library while also being the ones to organize its interior.

Soon enough they passed by the last floor of the library and saw only pitch black walls made of bedrock that were barely lit by some torches, but still they went deeper until finally they arrived at solid ground. Resting before them was the entrance to a large cave that at its end lie the grotto belonging to Kaminari's mentor, but instead of all of them walking into the maw of the cavernous hallway, he stopped them and told them to wait here.

"No one other then myself and his disciples are allowed to enter his personal grotto, so I will go alone."

He then turned swiftly and began his trek into the darkness to whatever lied beyond it. His footsteps grew fainter and fainter the farther he got away from them until finally they couldn't even hear them at all anymore, the dark abyss seemingly consuming him within all of its blackness. They waited for what seemed like forever until they felt Kaminari's presence begin to come back towards them, followed by a presence that was so strong and potent that it trumped the one given off by Rex Tyrannos and the four unknown Danger Beasts _combined_ three times over.

As they got closer they couldn't even hear Kaminari's footsteps over the heavy, booming footfalls that now accompanied him, which told that that whatever Danger Beast they belonged to its was most definitely a _big_ one. Another minute passed and Kaminari emerged from the darkness, however the looks of shock that everyone had did not come from him appearing, but from the ginormous dragon head that came out above him.

It's scales lining its neck were light grey and gold, and the fur was brownish grey with some grey feckless on either side of it's cheeks and snout. Two curled brown horns protruded from its skull just in front of its ears, and falling straight down from its snout were four tendrils that half-way down faded to an incredibly bright yellowish white. This same color was dominant in the hair that ran along its lower jawline and neck like a beard and from the top of his forehead down his spine, giving him an aged appearance much like an old wise man.

"Everyone, I would like to introduce to you my mentor." began Kaminari before he held his hands behind his back and allowed for the dragon to finish where he left off.

"Greetings, young ones. My name is Taiyang Xiao Long, the Keeper of Knowledge and owner of this library. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance."

"Um, hello." said Lucena shyly in the presence of the elder Danger Beast, its piercing red eyes staring at them closely as if they were under a microscope. "I'm Lucena."

She introduced everyone else there with her and in turn they each received a nod of respect from Taiyang until they were all finished and he looked at all of them out of intrigue.

"Now that I've met all of you, allow me to begin our discussion as to why I have summoned you all here. I am sure all of you have met those vile creatures that now plague the earth and disrupt its peace and harmony, correct?"

"The unknown Danger Beasts?" asked Tatsumi.

"Indeed, young Tatsumi. However, they are not unknown to me, and neither shall they be to to you now. They are known as Gigardos of the Sky, Skessa of the Frozen Tundra, Xelles of the Flame, and Karkatus of the Underground, and they are loyal subordinates of the being known as Mephistopheles, whom I have recently sensed for the first time in a great many thousands of years." informed Taiyang as he relaxed his body and rested on the ground.

"Mephistopheles? Who is that?"

"Kaminari, have you not told them of the adversary they now face?"

Kaminari shook his head and bowed slightly, "No Mentor, I thought that since you have more knowledge on him and his accomplices that I would allow you to be the one."

"Very well, I can see the logic behind that decision." he replied before clearing his throat and returned his attention to everyone. "Gather around, my friends, for I am about to inform you of a piece of history that has been lost to the ages. However, I will first give you a summarization of who exactly I am..."

Once everyone had gotten closer to him more of his body emerged from the dark hallway until his front two legs were visible so that he may lay down on them while he looked down over everyone and recalled his memory.

"Now, to start, as you may already know I am exceptionally old for a Danger Beast. That is because I was in one of the _first_ ever born into this world, which has allowed me to watch the world turn into what it is today and observe humanity grow from its humble beginnings." began Taiyang, his listeners remaining silent and letting their expressions broadcast their utter shock for them so as to not disrespect their elder. "I was the first Danger Beast who became _intelligent_ , to say the least, and was the creator of the technique that would allow us to manifest ourselves into a human form."

He let his words sink in for a few moments before he cleared his threat and gazed up from hiss position towards the barely visible light of the library's entrance above, his eyes closing as the memories came back to him like a gentle stream.

"More Danger Beasts like myself began to appear, and we forged our own kingdoms with each other, living and peace and harmony. Then humanity was born, and there were those among us that began to integrate themselves with your primitive ancestors and teach them our ways and knowledge. How to write, how to read, how to forge, and how to live."

Juno raised her hand politely in order to ask a question and when Taiyang noticed her he nod his head so that she may speak. "So...what your saying is that our kind of "true" ancestors were you and the other first Danger Beasts?"

"Indeed, young Juno, however there is more to that as well. But that will come later, for now, it is time for me to tell you of the tragic event that would later take place after humanity was educated to the point they grew and would go on to establish their own kingdoms and cultures. There was peace before...it was a wonderful time. If only...it could've stayed like that…"


	57. The Time before Time

A/N. YAAAAAY STORY TIME! And yeah, now that this chapter is out I can finally put up the full character bios for **Mephisto** , **Noctis** , and the others aside from Gigardos, Skess, Xelles and Karkatus, because those four will become relevant later on. Sorry for the late upload again, got struck with writer's block. Leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 56 - The Time before Time**

 **\- Several Million Years Ago -**

Long before the time of the Empire, the Western Nations, the Kingdom of Straelka, even longer before Avalon...the world was a very different place. Humans had spread out across the western continent, settling predominantly in the western plains, the central forests, the southern lands, and the far northern tundras. Each kingdom was similar, yet different due to the environment they were in.

Over time they grew larger as more people migrated to these small areas, building more houses and increasing their knowledge when the native Danger Beasts who lived in those environments taught them how to survive.

The best example would be the tribes who had founded the human Kingdom of Glacies in the north, who greatly revered the native Ice Dragon Clan living on the tundra and respected them. As a result, the clan's leader formed an alliance with the leaders of the human tribes and assisted them in learning how to survive in the cold.

The other Kingdoms, Avalonnis in the center of the continent, Babylon in the south, and Macedon in the West, also had some form of protection by Danger Beasts, however there were still those out there who choose to remain as themselves and continue their lives just as they always had.

The humans who knew of them respected that wish and left them alone, ensuring that peace existed so that both species could live and prosper without worry. The more well-known groups that practiced this ideology were the dragon clan led by the one known as the King of Beasts, Rex Tyrannos, who had made a reputation for himself as being a very powerful Danger Beasts that proudly led his kin. The other only consisted of two large serpents, a male and a female, who lived in the far south far away from human civilization, but did make trips every once in a while to Babylon.

"Come my love, it's time to make our trek to Babylon."

"Is is that time already?"

A beautiful woman, who appeared to be in her early to mid twenties, with long, flowing jet black hair, a pair of maroon horns, scale-like markings on her cheeks, and a smile that could soothe the heart of anyone lucky enough to see it approached a man with yellow and orange eyes, spiky black hair and scale-like marks that were similar to the woman's, and wrapped her arms around his. While he was dressed in dark maroon battle armor minus the helmet, she wore a more unique set that was black and purple with a battle skirt, heeled armored boots, arm guards and a chest piece that showed off a good portion of her sizeable bust.

"Yes, my dear Mephisto. Don't you want to go say hello? It does get quite lonely out here…"

The younger Mephisto rolled his eyes and chuckled before he suddenly picked up the woman and held her with an arm in the crook of legs behind her knees and the other around her arms and back, his face inches away from hers.

"Very well, you've charmed me into agreeing." he replied to the woman, who giggled lovingly as he stared into her purple and red eyes.

"Have I now? Is this just like that time I "charmed" you into falling in love with me?"

"No, that was completely different. That, my beloved Noctis, was because it was destiny."

 **\- Kingdom of Glacies, Far North -**

"Alright, pull them up!"

A group of men dressed in heavy fur winter coats grunted as they began to pull up a large net dipped into a hole cut out in the ice, the frigid water sloshing around with each tug until a large mass of net and wriggling fish wa set free. They dragged the bundle up onto the ice and the leader of the men gave a thumbs up to his associate, a giant dragon with white scales, horns and icy blue wings.

The dragon nod its head and sucked in a deep breath, waiting for the ice fishermen to clear away from the hole before it exhaled a stream of ice that refilled the hole and made it appear like it was never there in the first place.

With their food not secured, the men and their dragon companion began their trek through the ice and snow back towards a large stone city resting off in the distance, its towering spires their beacon. This was Glacies, the human kingdom of the north, and the dragon assisting its ice fishermen was a member of the clan of ice dragons that had helped establish it. It's leader was known to be a very kind and trustworthy beast to those it considered friends, and a brutal and ruthless adversary to anything that threatened them, earning it the nickname "Scourge of the North".

 **\- Present Day -**

"Okay, so let me get this straight. This Mephistopheles character is a Danger Beast as well? And that during your time a bunch of other Danger Beasts could take on a human form like you and Kaminari?" asked Lucena respectfully, the elder dragon pausing in its storytelling to nod his head.

"Indeed. I spread the technique out among my people so that they may use it to integrate themselves in with humans." replied Taiyang before he saw Esdeath raise her hand and wait for him to turn his gaze toward her.

"I have a question too. That nickname, "Scourge of the North", there's only one Danger Beast I know that had that nickname, and that was Alzora, the one that the Teigu Demon's Extract was made from. There's no way she could've lived that long...right?"

Taiyang chuckled a little and inhaled steadily, exhaling only after he had prepared his words in order to address the matter. "Yes, my dear, that is true. However, just like Tyrant is the son of Rex Tyrannos and he inherited his father's title, Alzora did the same from her *mother."

He then stared directly at Lucena and reached out with one claw, the Great General freezing as the giant hand came closer and closer to her until she felt it gently touch the base of her neck. A second finger curled back a little so that he could press its claw against her forehead, and while everyone else around her watched in silence Taiyang smiled at her and told her to relax.

" _ **What is he doing?**_ " asked Tyrant while watching through his holder's eyes.

" _I have no idea._ " replied back Alzora.

Taiyang chuckled again and addressed Lucena again, "My child, I can sense those residing inside of you. Please, allow me."

With that Taiyang closed his eyes and breathed deeply again, the dragon channeling his energy into his claw tips and calling out to the two auras he was referring to within Lucena's body. When they responded, he removed the claw touching Lucena's forehead and then slowly began to pull away the second one from her chest.

To everyone's awe, a glowing stream of red and blue energy followed Taiyang's claw away from Lucena and only after separating from her body did they drop to the ground like a puddle of jelly. Taiyang returned his hand to its original resting positioned and watched alongside the others in the cave as the two puddles began to morph and transform into an amorphous being devoid of any features.

Once the basic shape of a human being took form, the limbs began to solidify and become more realistic, with the bones, muscles and skin forming first, followed by clothing that differed from each individual. Immediately they could tell the one on the right was Tyrant, and when his body was finished constructing itself thanks to the strange technique Taiyang had used, he looked himself over with a careful eye.

He discovered he had taken on the human form of a tall, lanky man with a pale skin complexion, slicked back grey hair save for a single strand hanging down over the bridge of his nose, one scale-like marking on either cheek, and a slight stubble on his chin. His outfit consisted of a white dress shirt and red tie underneath a dark maroon button-up suit with flipped out light red collars inscribed with black petal-like designs, and a pocket filled with a white handkerchief and red rose over the left side of his chest. With this he had black dress pants and dark brown dress shoes, and for an added touch he had a top hat with the same color scheme resting atop his head.

"I like this...I like this a _lot_." he said in a gravelly voice unlike his usual domineering a powerful one as he turned around and looked up at Taiyang with a grin that showed off his sharpened fangs.

"Thanks."

"It was my pleasure."

With Tyrant now in human form, they looked to who they all knew would be Alzora as her body finished taking shape alongside her clothes, and to be quite honest, everyone was blown away at how stunningly beautiful she was. Just like her appearance in Esdeath's mind and later in Lucena's, Alzora took on the visage of a matured woman with two pairs of ice horns protruding out of her head, fair skin with some blue tattoo-like marks on certain parts of her body, silvery white hair with blue streaks in it, and grey sclerae with piercing red eyes.

She had a horned headpiece and wore a unique light blue dress with various silver markings on it that greatly emphasized her bust and cleavage, and two black stockings that were different lengths as well as heels made entirely of ice.

Alzora opened her eyes and flipped back some of her hair while smiling, her gaze moving to Tyrant when she caught him gawking at her with wide eyes.

"See something you like Tyrant?" she asked with a wink.

Tyrant coughed and averted his gaze while a round of laughter echoed out through the cavern at his embarrassment, even Taiyang shared a chuckle before he cleared his throat and addressed Tyrant and Alzora.

"Aside from you two regaining your bodies in this form, you can also return to your true form if you wish to as well. However, due to how little residual energy I had to work with, I could not fully restore you, meaning you have a lifespan just a little over that of a normal humans."

"Thank you Elder, I appreciate it." said Alzora with a courteous bow. "But back to Esdeath's question...you knew my mother? What was she like?"

"You have no memory of your mother?"

Alzora rubbed her arm gingerly and toed the ground while sighing heavily and shaking her head. "No. I was too young to remember her. According to my father, she died soon after I was born, and then a couple of years after that he too passed away because of some illness."

Taiyang nod his head in understanding and then smiled somewhat, an expression that she nor anyone else would think someone would make after discussing the death of a father and mother. When she questioned him about it he pushed it aside, claiming it to be something else that he had thought of, and asked for everyone to listen again so that he could continue his tale from where he had left off.

 **\- … -**

Glacies was a bustling kingdom full of people that had grown accustomed to the harsh conditions of the arctic tundra thanks to the ice dragons they coexisted with, and by far out of all the kingdoms it was the most popular and well off. No where else did the Danger Beast and Human populace live so well with one another, and the people here prided themselves on that fact where the ruler actively included the higher ranked dragons within the clan in their kingdom's political ventures so that their actions could benefit both parties.

"Thank you for coming today Miss Abraxas, it's always a pleasure to have you here." said the King of Glacies as he bowed and kissed the hand of the woman standing in front of him.

"Oh, you flatter me too much your highness." she replied with a giggle when she drew back her hand and parted with two men dressed in ice armor.

This was none other then the leader of the ice dragon clan, the legendary "Scourge of the North", and aside from her terrifying reputation she also held another for being quite possibly the most beautiful woman in the Kingdom. As a human, she took the form of a gorgeous young woman just entering her early to mid-twenties with white hair that she braided part of into a pony tail, grey sclerae and piercing red eyes with slit pupils.

She wore an alluring white dress with gold lining as that revealed her entire right thigh and leg, had long sleeves, and all over her body she had bright blue tattoos. Protruding out from both sides of her head were two small curved horns made of ice, and rather then wear any footwear she walked around barefoot wherever she went.

Her guards were undoubtedly also ice dragons in human form, and where she walked they did as well, their shields and spears of ice remaining at the ready at all times so that they could protect her.

" _Now that I'm done here...I should see what Wintorra is up to._ " she thought with a smile as she left the kingdom palace and turned left, her destination already in mind.

Meanwhile halfway across the continent, another famous Danger Beast had just accomplished its hunt and was chowing down on its prey alongside other members of its clan since they all travelled together on these kinds of trips.

" **There is plenty to go around, so enjoy yourselves. Today, we feast!** " announced Rex Tyrannos to his kin after swallowing the mouthful of Danger Beast flesh he had teared from the ribs of his prey, the other dragons roaring their approval.

"No wonder everyone chose you to be clan leader. You always know where the best food is."

Rex Tyrannos turned and watched as a female dragon walked over to his spot and rested herself next to him, her own kill within her grasp already half-eaten. She popped the rest into her gaping maw and chewed on it while she stared at Tyrant with her two eyes at the four that he had, which was a rarity among their species.

" **That? I thought it was because I was the biggest and strongest.** " he replied, the female dragon snickering.

"Arrogant much?"

" **It is not arrogance, Tyrvant, it is fact. There is no one else who is stronger then I.** " stated Rex Tyrannos matter-of-factly.

"What about Mephistopheles?" asked Tyrvant with a gleam in her eye, the male dragon coughing on his food a little and staring at her. "Or what about Ta-"

" **Okay I get your point. I may not be *the strongest around, but I'm sure that I am among our kin.** "

They shared a laugh before they continued to eat with the rest of the fire dragons until their appetites were satisfied and they returned to their home for the day, from which one could just barely make out the kingdom of Avalonnis in the distance.

At the city itself, a lone knight standing atop the protective stone wall surrounding the kingdom watched in silence the dragons as they flew in the sky towards their dens, a sigh escaping his lips as he turned away and returned to his duties. His pristine white armor glistened in the sun, the light breeze causing the blue pony tail protruding out from the back of his helmet to whip slightly from left to white.

" _The times are so peaceful...not even hostile Danger Beasts aside from the ones we know and live with are active. I hope nothing happens to change it..._ "

 **\- Kingdom of Babylon -**

 **\- Five Hours Later -**

"I love coming here...the people here are always so lively." remarked Noctis with a carefree smile as she and Mephisto walked through the streets of Babylon, arm in arm.

"Indeed, my dear."

They were common faces there among the populace and were considered to be the city's treasured couple, especially Noctis due to the fact she was a motherly figure that cared greatly for anyone, regardless of their species. Everywhere they walked they received smiles from the populace, from the time they first enter the city to when they leave it after accomplishing what they set out to do.

Today however, they just strolled around the bustling city with no set purpose in mind, and when the sun finally began to set they decided to return back to their home.

Another difference that separated them from other Danger Beasts was that they lived and ate like human beings, despite the fact that their true forms were that of large serpents easily over several hundred feet in length. Mephisto personally disliked the idea, but he tolerated it at the behest of his love Noctis for it was her curiosity and fascination with humanity that led them to transform their lifestyle.

"Noctis, why do you find such interest in human mannerisms?" he asked out of the blue as they made the nightly stroll to their bedroom.

"What do you mean?" she replied back.

"We are beasts, born in a completely different world from the humans. We were the ones to teach and educate them from their primitive state, and I've heard that some even worship us as gods. Why are you so attached to them?"

Noctis lowered her gaze from his and closed her eyes while smiling and holding a hand up to the base of her neck. "I...I find them interesting. They're such a young species, but I'm amazed that they're taking what we taught them and expanding upon it beyond our wildest imagination. They've already constructed civilizations for themselves, and I have a feeling that there will come a time when our two species will start to breed with one another to produce something even greater."

They reached their bedroom and Mephisto was about to open the doors before he turned to face Noctis and smiled, which caused her to blush. He hugged her tightly and rested his chin on the top of her head while sighing heavily, a sign that she had learned over the years that meant he had finally accepted something as unchangeable.

"To be honest, I've had my doubts about humanity, but if you believe that they can only bring us good as a species...then I guess It's time I start too."

 **\- Present Day -**

"And...then what happened?" asked Leone in a low tone, Taiyang closing his eyes and letting out a heavy breath.

"When they entered their room, they were met by humans who wanted to assassinate them. Angered at the fact that they would threaten them, Mephistopheles slaughtered them in cold blood despite the pleas of Noctis to spare them and figure out the solution behind it. At that moment in time, Mephistopheles swore to turn humanity into a slave race to our kind."

"T-That's horrible…" murmured Akame at the thought of their entire species being turned into slaves, something they all couldn't quite comprehend.

However that wasn't the most shocking part of Taiyang's tale, for when he coughed to regather their attention he switched his legs around so that he was resting on one over the other and looked at the wall behind them. There was nothing inscribed on its surface, but he was staring so intensly at it that it seemed like he was staring into the very past itself.

"As a result of that, Mephistopheles went on to gather allies who shared his sentiments and instigate the worst event this world has ever come to know. A conflict that ravaged this entire continent and caused the destruction of two of the four kingdoms and a dizzying loss of life equal only scale to genocide. The Great War of man and Danger Beast."


	58. In Hiding

A/N Oh...oh my. The Great War, that does not sound good. Moving on, I've completed the pages for **Mephistopheles** , **Rex Tyrannos** , and **Garmr**. **Kaminari** , **Noctis** , and **Abraxa** s will come later because I have yet to draw Kaminari and I'm waiting to add in Noctis and Abraxas until more information for them comes out from the story itself so that it is relevant. Ugh...I am so behind in this Part 2. The first part of the story for pretty much in its entirety I was like seven chapters ahead of the current one since I had already written them out, god I need to get back on track, but unfortunately guys this will probably be the last update for the next week or so because I got Finals to study for in College. YAY FOR ME...FUCK. Wish me luck, and leave a fav and review.

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 **Chapter 57 - In Hiding**

 **\- Throne Room, The Bastion -**

Mephisto finished relaying his latest orders to Gigardos and the others before turning around and noticing that Hikari was standing off in a corner by herself, her posture broadcasting to him that something was off.

He strolled over to her and placed a hand on her shoulder, the assassin glancing up and surprising him with the tears in her eyes. "Hikari? What is the matter?"

"Nothing...I'm fine."

"You're clearly not fine. Tell me what's bothering you."

Hikari sniffed and wiped the tears from her eyes, her body fully rotating so that she was facing him directly, and sighed heavily as her shoulders dropped a few inches. Mephisto tried to guess that it was something that had to do with her appearance being different, so he changed her eyes and hair color back to their original one, but it did nothing to help her.

"I...I don't know if I can keep doing this…" she said in almost a whisper. "Helping you and such...all of my friends and family probably think I'm some monster…"

" _Ahh...this again…_ "

"You are no monster. If anything, Garmr is the-"

"That's not what I'm getting at!" shouted Hikari angrily, he outburst shutting Mephisto up quickly.

She clenched both of her hands tightly and growled at herself for acting like this, her gaze dropping from his when the tears stated to come around again. "I mean...I helped capture Rafe and my own father...everyone must think I'm a traitor. What will they say when we finally see one another again after so long? My friends will hate me, Lucena will hate me..."

Hikari's knees wobbled and she would've certainly collapsed if it hadn't been for Mephisto gently wrapping his arms around her and embracing her. She gasped a little at how quick the movement was, but without an argument she accepted it and burrowed her face into the crease of his chest plate, the armor's metal surprisingly giving off a warm aura that soothed her.

"I don't know who your friend are, or who this Lucena is exactly, but I can tell that you care very deeply for her, and that they do for you as well. I'm sure that they would understand if they had the time to listen." said Mephisto softly and with care, being sure to make Hikari feel that everything would turn out okay.

"But what if you said that would happen turned out to be true? What do I do then?"

Mephisto closed his eyes and thought for a moment, the question he knew he would have to face eventually rearing its ugly head. He had to be sure to choose his next few words very carefully, Hikari's emotions were on the edge and what he said could either bring about a good or even worse situation.

"You have to have faith."

Hikari finally looked back up at Mephisto after she had lowered her head earlier with wide eyes, the response consuming her with confusion.

"W-What?"

"You just have to have faith. You cannot doubt yourself, not now. Lucena and your friends will come around in the end, I'm sure of it." said Mephisto as he let go of Hikari and crossed his arms. "But...if you want to see it, and confirm it for yourself...you may go to where they are right now."

"Where they are?" asked Hikari, her eyes lighting up. "You know where they are?"

"Yes, I've known for quite some time. However, if I tell you where they are, you must promise me that you will try to see and or meet with the person you trust most, and that you must do so in an isolated area. Okay?"

Hikari nod her head, that person already in her mind, and Mephisto chuckled at her eagerness to know what the location was. He took her underneath his arm again and as they left the throne room he divulged unto her everything that he knew.

 **\- Unclaimed Territory, Eastern Continent -**

"Ugh...my head...what in the hell happened…" muttered Morgan with a growl as he picked himself up off of whatever he was laying down on and ran a hand through his hair.

He found out from that motion he wasn't wearing his beanie, and after blinking a few times to get his eyesight back in working order, he discovered that wasn't the only thing wrong with him. He was surrounded by rocks on all sides, most likely the walls of a cave, and that he was sitting down on a bed of grass that had grown in the soft dirt underneath the gentle ray of sunlight coming down above him.

The next great shock was that laying down right next to him were both of his parents, both of them still fast asleep, and when he tried to find his Teigu it didn't take him long since it was leaning up against a nearby wall a few feet away from them.

" _What is this palace?_ " he thought as he slipped on his beanie when he found it and stood up, the soreness in his limbs stopping him from moving around at first until he stretched it out of his system.

When his back popped and he felt a rush of soreness leave his body, he froze when directly in front of him from the cave entrance appeared a young man around his age with messy brown hair that faded to auburn at the tips. He was wearing a black and grey suit with a white dress shirt and red tie, and for some reason his face seemed familiar to him.

"Oh, you're awake. Are you ok, Prince Morgan?"

"I'm the one asking the questions here, and don't refer to me as Prince either. Morgan is fine." growled Morgan. "Who are you, and where did you take us?"

The young man cleared his throat and adjusted his tie before saying, "My name is Roman, and you are in a cave system located in the Unclaimed Territory."

"The Unclaimed Territory? Why so far out? What's happened?"

"We would like to know that a well."

Morgan whirled around and grinned when Solomon picked himself up off the ground and helped Camilla, who had also just awoke from her comatose state, back to her feet. They both crossed their arms and Roman bowed out of expect for the rulers, which caught them off guard considering this person could very well be their kidnappers.

"Of course, your highness. Unfortunately, a grave predicament has befallen the capital city and the country as a whole. Those four Danger Beasts you three were engaging with managed to subdue you, and they were about to take ou all away as well if I had not intervened and taken you away."

"That's right...I remember now…" murmured Camilla as she rubbed her head.

"Yes, so after that, I brought you here so that you could be safe while you recovered." added on Roman to finish his explanation of how they had gotten to the cave.

"Well, that takes care of one question…" said Morgan ass he rubbed his chin in thought and then stared at Roman with a steely-eyed gaze. "What about the capital? What did those beasts do to it?"

"Nothing to bad, thankfully. Before leavening to rescue you, I met with a Indigo Guard member who told me she was evacuating the citizens to the underground bunkers so they wouldn't be harmed." replied Roman with a small smile, which brought some relief to them.

" _Thank goodness...Chelsea, I'm gonna have to thank you later._ " thought Solomon.

"However...as of now the entire capital cannot be breached from the outside any more. One of those Danger Beasts created an incredibly thick ice dome around the city's perimeter, trapping everyone inside of it." continued Roman with a dejected tone. "And now, those four Danger Beasts guard it day and night, not letting anyone get in close."

Solomon cursed and started to pace around the small enclosure, mumbling incomprehensible words under his breath while Camilla and Morgan remained where they were in silence. With just a single pin-pointed attack those four Danger Beasts had crippled their entire nation and now effectively held it hostage by taking away their air force and discerning any other outside forces from attacking by their very presence.

For Danger Beasts, the assault had been to ingenious and too effective to have been created by them alone. There was most definitely someone in the background ordering them, yet they had no idea who it could be.

"If only we could get to the Empire and see what's happened over there…" muttered Morgan to his mother, who nod her head in agreement.

"Well...about that…"

Camilla, Solomon, and Morgan all looked at Roman when he spoke up, the three of them waiting in anticipation for what the young man had to say. "There's...someone here who can tell you that. If you could just follow me."

Roman spun on his heel and walked out of the lit cave, Morgan and his parents following close behind as he led them through a darkened tunnel to an unknown destination. It started to get brighter around them and soon enough the three had to squint their eyes when Roman took them out of the caves and out into the brightly shining sun of the outside world.

Camilla looked over her shoulder at the cave entrance they had just walked out of and saw that it was apart of a large hill covered with grass that blended in with the rolling plain sprawling out around them.

What shocked them even more then their peaceful surroundings was the wooden cottage resting a few yards away from them, the building just large enough to house two, maybe three people.

"Is this where you live?" asked Solomon of Roman, who nod his head once before motioning for them to come inside.

They anxiously followed him inside, with Solomon walking in through the doorway first, and he didn't even take a second step in before he was suddenly met with an aura that he hadn't felt in a _long_ time. He glanced over at Roman and the auburn color in his hair and almost instantly it all clicked together in his mind just as the sound of footsteps coming from the floor above them struck his eardrums.

Camilla soon recognized the presence as well and they both stared with with mixed expressions of horror and shock painted on their faces when from the stairs situated in the center of the house appeared the person they least expected to see.

"Here they are, they just woke up a few minutes ago."

A flash of auburn and a cocky grin were the only characteristics they needed to confirm their suspicions. "Well, I never would've thought that this would happen."

"W-What?!"

 **\- Taiyang's Library -**

"The...Great War…?"

Taiyang nod his head solemnly out of sadness when memories of the terrible time came back to him, dropping his spirit to an even lower point then when he first addressed the event before beginning his story.

"Yes...It was horrible...all I could feel for the world was pain and sorrow." he replied quietly, which was unusual even for him.

Even when he hadn't told them any relevant information about what exactly took place during this so-called Great War, Lucena and the others immediately could tell that it was so terrible it could make even someone such as Taiyang shudder. Fiona glanced over at Kaminari and even he too had a grim expression on his face that broadcasted his own feelings about it.

"Um, Taiyang, before you continue with your story, could you give us some more information about another Danger Beast?" asked Leonard respectfully after the dragon was given time to recover.

"Of course. Who is it?"

"It's this giant red dog...with three heads. Who is he, and how does he relate to Mephistopheles and Rex Tyrannos?"

"Ahh...him…"

Taiyang snorted a little and developed a disgusted look on his face upon recalling the certain Danger Beast Leonard was referring to. "That would Garmr, one of Mephistopheles' top lieutenants, but not as prominent as Rex Tyrannos, however he still was a great threat."

It seemed as if he was going to continue talking to them, but after taking a deep breath he picked himself off the ground and glanced up towards the library and blinked a few times.

"I am sorry, my friends, but I require some rest...my age has caught up to me yet again."

He bid farewell to everyone and told them that they could look around the library if they wished, they could sleep in some guest rooms that he had his followers prepare before their arrival, or do anything else they wished outside the tower itself as long as they did not leave the confines of the glass desert.

With all of that said he turned around and returned to the darkness of his inner sanctum, and to return them back to the first level of the library Lucena lifted them all up once again with several ice platforms. Once they got back to the first set of bridges directly underneath the tower entrance Kaminari turned to face them all with his arms crossed and sighed.

"So, everyone, a little tip before you head off. If you're going to explore the library, I recommend you have one of mentor's guardians accompany you so that they can lead you back here if you get lost. Like mentor said, don't leave the confines of the glass desert, however if you want to there is a fairly nice beach a little ways away."

"If it's all the same to you, it's a habit of mine now, I'm going to line the perimeter of this place with some of my threads just in case. Peace." said Lubbock before he used Cross Tail to vault himself up through the tower and back outside.

Slowly the group broke apart to explore different parts of the library until all that remained was Tatsumi, Esdeath, Lucena, Selena, Maya and Juno, the group still standing on one of the bridges connecting the different aisles over the chasm beneath them.

"Well, I'm sorry, but I can't hold my curiosity back any further. Mom, you want to come with me to look at some books about the history of Avalon? Arthur's kingdom before the Empire?" asked Juno of Maya, since Arthur was her closest friend.

"That sounds interesting! See you guys later!" said Maya excitedly before she hurried off with her daughter, the two meeting up with on the wolfs that assisted Taiyang with his library on the way so that they wouldn't get lost.

Tatsumi rolled his eyes, Esdeath giggled a little at their sudden departure, and Lucena and Selena just merely crossed their arms and slowly shook their heads side to side.

"I guess we should do the same too?"

"Why not? Let's go see what we can find."

 **\- Unclaimed Territory, Eastern Continent -**

Solomon and Camilla were left totally floored at the sight off the one person they had never expected to see again, but after Roman managed to snap them out of their stupor the person standing next to him placed a hand on their hip and pointed at Morgan with a raised eyebrow.

"Well, aren't you going to introduce me?"

Solomon blinked a few times and stepped to the right a little so Morgan could have a clearer view of the house owner and blinked again in disbelief. "R-Right. Morgan, this is Jacqueline, an old...acquaintance of ours."

"Wait, Jacqueline? As in _that_ Jacqueline, the former Great General that nearly destroyed the Empire? I thought she died!" stammered Morgan as the auburn-haired woman bowed a little and chuckled.

"Yes, that is I, although that part of me is all the past. Esdeath decided to spare me even after everything that I had done as long as I agreed to never show my face again." she replied back.

Solomon and Camilla were still left without anything to say considering they still couldn't quite believe what they were seeing. In the twenty years that had passed since they had toppled the corrupt Empire and saved its capital from being annihilated by the Shikoutazer, Jacqueline had changed fairly little in appearance.

Her hair had grown slightly longer and she had braided part of it into two pony tails, and present under her uniquely colored eyes were small, barely noticeable wrinkles that showed her age. And instead of her typical style of dress they remember her wearing she wore something a little more formal, a black and red sleeveless cheongsam with one detached sleeve over her right arm and black armor-plated vambraces that reached up to her knees over black heels.

Other then these differences she was still the same Jacqueline they remember from twenty years earlier, minus the presence of Devil's Heart. Solomon however noticed the bone sword, Basilisk, hanging up on the wall to their left, and when Jacqueline grinned he saw the sharpened fangs that told him she still had Absordex as well.

"Where's that other girl, the one with white hair?" asked Camilla as she looked around after noticing she wasn't there.

"Oh, Kahfka? She'll be back any moment, she had gone out to hunt, so we can just wait in here for her."

"Hunt? You guys hunt Danger Beasts out here?" questioned Morgan as she led them into the living room directly to their left.

"Well of course, how else are we going to eat?"

"So you guys don't go to the capital?"

Jacqueline shook her head and leaned back in her chair while flipping back some of her hair, motioning to Roman with a hand wave. "He goes into the city to bring us other essentials as well as inform us of what goes on and such."

"About that...what kind of relationship do you guys share?" asked Camilla lightly, Jacqueline and Roman looking at one another for a few moments before Jacqueline cleared her throat and crossed one leg over the other.

"Of course, I almost forgot. Roman is-"

She was cut off by the opening of the front door and immediately all heads turned towards the entrance when Kahfka, Jacqueline's longtime lover and partner as well as loyal subordinate when she was still the Empire's Great General, walked in and shed her black trench coat.

"Welcome back Kahfka! As you can see, our guests are awake." greeted Jacqueline happily, her white-haired companion grinning as she walked around the chairs and sat down next to her in the couch.

"Yes, they are. Nice to see you guys again after so long." said Kahfka to Solomon and Camilla, who nodded their response back.

Like Jacqueline, the former assassin hadn't changed much in attitude and appearance in the twenty years since she had participated in the battle at the Imperial Capital. Her clothes were the greatest change, and they matched Jacqueline's new choice in dress in that she wore a black cheongsam with one sleeve on her left arm, with the edges of the collar and the opening for the left arm being gold colored. There were gold designs along the upper chest and right sleeve as well, and hanging around her neck was a small golden heart pendant that Camilla noticed matched one that Jacqueline wore as well.

The right side of her dress was open from the hip down and underneath she wore a dark reddish grey colored pantyhose. Her pristine white hair had also grown longer as well, reaching down to the back of her calves now, and she no longer had the six-like metal object that hovered over her left ear.

"So, what have you told them so far?" asked Kahfka of Jacqueline after settling herself in. "Do they know of what's happened in the Empire?"

"No, we were just about to get to that."

"What's happened there?" asked Morgan intensely, the two women jumping slightly at her forceful he sounded.

He apologized to them and Jacqueline sighed while leaning forward and resting her arms in her lap, a concerned expression on her face. "What's happened here in Straelka is bad, yes, but across the ocean...it is far worse there."

"The Empire and the Western Nations were all taken over by hostile Danger Beasts, the first by a dragon and the second by a three-headed dog with blood red fur. Each city is totally cut off from one another, and according to someone I met there in the Empire after slipping inside I learned the Emperor was defeated by the dragon after five days of continuous fighting, and that Tatsumi, Esdeath and the others are nowhere to be found." informed Kahfka with a straight face, the news distasteful to not only her but Solomon, Camilla and Morgan as well.

It was the last thing they wanted to hear, and now that they finally knew their situation just got a whole lot worse then before.

"So then...what can we do?"

"For now, in my opinion, we need to wait for a little while and strike when they least expect it. Those Danger Beasts will be on their guard considering you've only been here for a couple of days, so the best course of action is to wait." said Jacqueline as she got up from the couch with Kahfka.

"But what about our friends in the Empire? What about them?" asked Morgan.

The former assassin fixated her cybernetic eye on his alone and crossed her arms across her chest, her expression doing nothing to make him feel better. "I'm sorry to be so blunt, but as of right now, there's nothing we can do. We have no idea what we're up against, so if we just went over there without any knowledge about our enemies and their abilities, we would be shooting ourselves in the foot."

For Morgan and his parents, the truth hurt them to the point they didn't ask any further questions since it would be pointless to do so. Despite their relationship as former enemies turned into something under acquaintances, they were both still master tacticians that could effectively see well ahead of them and plan accordingly.

"So until we can get a better grasp on our opposition, you guys should stay here with us so that you won't be hunted down by those Danger Beasts and whoever they're in league with." finished Roman when Kahfka left Jacqueline's side to bring in the kill she had dragged home for their next meal.

Before Jacqueline departed for the kitchen, she remembered Camilla's question about Roman and after turning around she glanced back over her shoulder and gave them all her trademark grin they had all come to hate in the past.

"Oh yeah, and about Roman. He's my son."


	59. Fire and Ice

A/N Okay guys, I have returned from Finals. They're all over now (not really, still have two more), so we can return to our regularly scheduled programing. Thanks for hanging in there. Moving on...yeah you guys probably already suspected that Roman had something to do with Jacqy just because of the auburn color in his hair. But yeah, now that finals are done, for the most part, I can fully devote myself to churning out chapters as fast as I can before next semester. On another note, I've done a lot of work on the Wiki and first off I have added the updated images of **Jacqueline** and **Kahfka** in their post-timeskip attire, so check them out, and I have also changed the info boxes for all of the Teigu and the characters to match more closely with the ones on the Akame ga Kill wiki. Leave a fav and review, and once again thank you guys for waiting this long!

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 **Chapter 58 - Fire and Ice**

A full day of searching the infinite rows of books within Taiyang's library passed by excruciatingly slow, but finally after what seemed like an eternity Kaminari called on everyone to return to Taiyang's inner grotto so that he could continue telling them of the Great War he had spoken of previously. The only things they knew about it was that it took place between Danger Beasts wanting to turn humanity into a slave race, led by Mephistopheles, and humanity itself, who was most likely allied with Danger Beasts who wanted to protect them.

Once everyone had gathered around the elder Danger Beast, either choosing to sit down or remain standing, Taiyang cleared his throat and gathered his thoughts.

"I apologize for keeping all you waiting or such a long time. Now, to begin, I will be starting in the midst of the war's seventh year, so I will give you a basic summary of what had occurred up to that point. First off, like I stated previously Mephistopheles gathered allies from across the continent and amassed a massive army, which was led by him personally as well as appointed Generals who reported directly to him."

"How many Generals did he have?" asked Lucena when she saw the Danger Beast pause.

"Many, but the most powerful and well known were Garmr, nicknamed the Supreme War God...and your father, Tyrant."

Tyrant felt as if someone had punched him in the chest and Alzora had to react quickly in order to prevent him from collapsing to his knees. He had clear memories of his father, but he had never known that he had actually desired to subjugate humanity.

"Is that true?" he asked.

Taiyang nod his head once and closed his eyes for a few moments. "Indeed. In fact, Rex Tyrannos was the greatest and most powerful of Mephistopheles' Generals. Alongside his kin of the fire dragons, who followed him with undying loyalty, he held the largest army that won many battles, most notably being the siege and fall of the Kingdom of Macedon. Babylon around this time as well had been utterly annihilated by Mephistopheles personally, but that is beside the point. For a good majority of the war, your father was dealing with a far greater task."

"What exactly was that?"

"The Siege of the Northern Kingdom, Glacies. You see, when the war began, Glacies wasn't immediately attacked, so the people there had time to prepare themselves for the eventual arrival of the enemy." began Taiyang with a small smirk when he pointed at Alzora with a single claw. "Your mother and the other ice dragons helped them greatly in doing so, since she had vowed to protect Glacies with her life."

After being told this much so far Lucena crossed her arms over her chest and began to put together the pieces given to them. First off, Mephistopheles had started a war between Danger Beasts and man because he and his lover were threatened by humans. One kingdom had fallen and the other had been annihilated, which left just Glacies and Avalonnis, which she assumed to be the ancient predecessor to Arthur's kingdom, Avalon.

Then there came the matter of the endgame. If there were so many intelligent Danger Beasts back then, so many that there were massive armies comprised of them, where did they all go? The first thought she had was they had hid themselves away from the public eye and eventually died due to natural causes, while others must've died in the war.

" _Casualties are unavoidable in war, and if it lasted up to seven years, then there must've been a ton._ " she told herself in a matter-of-fact tone.

When Taiyang started to speak again she left her thoughts for another time and listened to the Danger Beast speak more about the northern siege.

"Rex Tyrannos and his armies were tasked with conquering Glacies, and they were met with stalwart resistance from Abraxas, her kin, and the humans she had allied herself with. They would do battle with one another across the frozen tundras for three years, and both sides received heavy casualties."

Taiyang had to stop himself again when an influx of emotions struck him, the painful memory paralyzing him for a few moments.

"Rex Tyrannos lost a great many members of his clan, Abraxas too, and it was in the sixth year of the siege, the seventh for the war as a whole, where both sides decided it was time to bring an end to it. Rex Tyrannos gathered all of his forces and in a similar fashion to how you laid siege to the Imperial Capital of the Empire twenty years ago, he attacked Glacies with everything he had. Even he took to the battlefield, which called for Abraxas to do so as well and engage him head on."

 **\- Several Million Years Ago -**

 **\- Kingdom of Glacies, Far North -**

Rex Tyrannos let out a mighty roar as he smashed his way through the weakened ice dome before him, the structure a part of a series of ice domes built around the Kingdom of Glacies to delay his army for as long as possible. There had been twenty five domes made, each one smaller then the previous one as they got closer to the city itself, but they were incredibly thick and hard to destroy. To make it even more difficult, Glacies had split its army up so that there were soldiers guarding each dome from within miniature ice fortresses.

Currently Rex Tyrannos had just broken his way through the eighteenth ice dome, and he was quickly discovering that it was progressively getting harder and harder to penetrate the ice, even with his fire. In the years that had transpired during his siege of the northern kingdom, his forces had repeatedly been pushed back by their enemy, only ever managed to get through one, sometimes two of the ice domes before they had to retreat.

" _ **That female ice dragon...she and her kin were definitely their strongest asset, but their numbers have dwindled to the point to near annihilation.**_ " he thought as he leaped past the broken ice dome and cleared a way for his ground troops to follow him through.

He looked back over his shoulder and felt a heavy weight grip his heart as he watched Tyrvant and the three remaining dragons of his kin approach the hole he had made. There had been so many of them before the war, and now, seven years later, he had lost good friends and loved ones. Tyrvant had lost a brother during this six-year long siege, which had been the catalyst that led them to step away from the war and return to their sacred homeland farther south to bury their dead kin.

"Are you okay, Rex?"

Rex Tyrannos jumped a little at the sudden question and saw that while he was trapped within the doldrums of his own mind, Tyrvant and strided up next to him with the rest of the fire dragons.

" **Yes, I'm fine. I was...reminiscing.** "

"About what?" questioned another dragon next to her.

" **This war, and our kin. Our numbers have dwindled so much, and all I can feel is pain for those we have lost. I don't want to watch any more off you fall in battle.** " said Rex Tyrannos solemnly while lowering his head, his response stirring up a feeling of pity inside of Tyrvant.

"I feel that way as well, Rex." she said, her hand rising up to the side of his scaly cheek in order to cup it gently. "But we cannot stand idly by as our leader risks his own life for his ideals. We _will_ fight beside you, through thick and thin."

Rex Tyrannos looked around at the other dragons of his clan and couldn't help but smile when they all nod their heads in agreement. There was no changing their minds, and he was proud to know that he was surrounding by such loyal followers.

" **Thank you, Tyrvant.** " said Rex Tyrannos when she leaned her head forward and gently placed her forehead against his while her eyes were closed, which for their species was not only a gesture of commitment to another...but one of compassion and love.

With his doubts nonexistent Rex Tyrannos stood proud and tall like he always had and pointed his finger towards the next ice dome and beyond, the Kingdom of Glacies just waiting for them beyond their sight.

" **We move onward!** "

Meanwhile, at Glacies itself, the remaining defense forces were scrambling to ready the city for the eventual arrival of the dragon general and his troops. Abraxas herself however had another idea in mind, one that would give them another advantage against their enemy, and she was on her way there right then.

She had lost a lot of good friends, and there were now only a handful of them left. She wanted to keep them safe, but their wills could not be broken, so instead of trying to keep them from fighting...she decided to find someone who could help them.

" _This is probably going to be the craziest ever, but at this point I don't care. We're gonna need all the help we can get._ " she thought to herself as she leaped down into the courtyard of one of the city's inner fortresses.

She had to ask around for a few minutes before she got the information she needed and followed the given directions to where the person she was looking for was at.

"Wintorra?" she called out after rounding the corner of the fortress barracks , hoping for a response.

She opened the door to the barracks and almost ran straight into another person trying to leave them. After the near collision both of them gasped when they recognized one another, and almost instantly they shared a hug.

"Wintorra! It's been too long my child."

"Hello Alzora, it's good to see you again too." replied the other woman with a smile after relinquishing one another from their grasp.

Wintorra was a beautiful young woman with waist length blue hair and blue eyes, and just like the entirety of the population her skin was pale, almost ceramic-like due to the winter climate. She wore a fitting light blue dress with intricate blue, white and gold designs on it and a golden chain belt with a gold flower hanging from it around her waist, as well as a white and black jacket. Covering her legs were spotted skin-tight black leggings, and protecting her from the knee down was white, grey and gold armored heels.

Out of all the humans living in Glacies, no one was as close to her as Wintorra, who had been her friend for the longest time. Abraxas had come to know her when she was very young, and to be perfectly honest if it hadn't been for her, she would've been dead. Like most of the citizens of the kingdom, she was a member of one of the prominent clans who helped found Glacies and shape it into what it is today.

Unfortunately, they had a terrible rule instituted among them that every newborn child that was birthed into the clan was to be sent out onto the tundra to survive for an entire week. Survival and returning to the clan meant they were fully accepted as members, while death meant you were forgotten. The key ideology was "survival of the fittest", only the strong survive, which has led the clan to produce the finest warriors among all of the human kingdoms combined.

How this related to Wintorra was that she hadn't just been cast out onto the frozen tundra, she had been cast out during the worst time of the year where snowstorms raged across the area day and night, and she had later discovered that her own parents did not want her and instead wanted a son. For days she wondered the frozen tundra, cold, scared, and extremely weak, and by slimmest chance Abraxas had discovered her while hunting for food on the verge of death from dehydration, lack of food, and other things.

Abraxas took her back to her clan's home, a small hilly area dominated by several large ice caves, and with some help from her kin she was able to bring her back from death itself. She quickly came to love and care for Wintorra as if she were her own daughter and raised her as a member of her dragon clan, teaching her how to survive out on the frozen tundra like them.

When she was old enough to live on her own Wintorra made her way back to her clan's home, thinking that she would be accepted since she had survived, but she had been sorely mistaken. She had already been forgotten, and to make it worse her parents, even after seeing how much she had grown and how strong she had become, they still did not want her.

Heartbroken and angry, Wintorra ran away back out to the tundra and returned to Abraxas, the only one who had actually cared about her and her wellbeing. There she remained until the Great War, where she alongside her family took up arms to protect Glacies.

"Why were you calling out my name?" asked Wintorra, pulling Abraxas out of the deep recesses of her mind.

"Oh, right. Could you please come with me?"

Wintorra followed her friend away from the barracks and into the middle of the courtyard, the most open and spacious part of the fortress, where she looked her straight in the eyes and crossed her arms.

"Wintorra, I'm going to be blunt with here. Some time soon, Rex Tyrannos and his army will be here at the fronts gates of Glacies, and as it is right now there is an extremely slim chance that we'll be able to win against him." said Abraxas grimmly, her blue-haired friend's smile dropping to a more serious expression.

"The defenses aren't holding out?"

"No, he's breaking through them all at a rapid pace. If we're going to be able to survive, we'll have to confront him before he reaches the city and defeat him." replied Abraxas.

"If you go out there and fight him, what'll happen if you lose? There will be nothing that could stand in the way of him taking over Glacies!" objected Wintorra to the idea, since there was a very real chance of dying against the fire dragon leader.

Abraxas was strong, that was an undeniable fact, but Rex Tyrannos was a whole different story. He was able to simultaneously subdue five of their ice dragons by himself without even receiving a single injury. They had also heard that the blood running through his veins was so hot that the subarctic weather they had at certain parts of the year hardly affected him, which seemed impossible because even Abraxas and her species had trouble dealing with it.

"That's why we're not going to lose." stated Abraxas rigidly, the determined look on her face oddly relaxing to Wintorra. "I'm going to try something that's never been attempted before, something that should give us an edge and a little bit of element of surprise."

"And what would that be?"

Wintorra suddenly took Wintorra's right hand into her own and with utter seriousness in her gaze and tone, she said, "You're going to drink some of my blood."

"What?!" stammered Wintorra in disbelief. "What is that supposed to do?!"

"As you know, my people had the ability to willingly manifest ice either from our breath or from our body, and can manipulate like it was a part of our body." started Abraxas, which Wintorra nod her head to. "The reason for that is a special gene that exists in our blood, and here recently I had a thought."

Abraxas closed her eyes and after a second a unique looking symbol manifested itself above her cleavage at the base of her neck, its appeared causing Wintorra to look at it with mixed feelings of confusion and wonder when she felt an alluring pull come from it.

"Wintorra, if you drink my blood, there is a very good possibility that it will fuse with your own and you'll gain our ice manipulation abilities. I don't know if it'll work, but at this point…"

"I'll do it."

Abraxas was caught off guard by her friend's quick approval to go along with it, but chuckled nonetheless at the look on her face.

"At this point, if it'll help protect Glacies, I'll do it. Besides...manipulating ice sounds really cool." said Wintorra with a grin, the two friends sharing a laugh with one another.

When they each calmed down Abraxas snapped her fingers and created a small dagger of ice in her left hand, her right hand turning over when she brought the blade up. Quick and clean she cut through her skin to make a cut just deep enough to where it wouldn't hinder her too much and then turned the dagger into a cup of ice. Wintorra watched as Abraxas squeezed her hand tightly over the cup, the pressure forcing her blood to drip slowly out from the wound and through her fingers into the cup.

By the time her hand had started to quiver and turn white from how hard she was squeezing, a decent amount of her blood had fallen into the cup and nearly filled it up. She finally stopped and let out a steady breath when the tingling sensation in her fingers started to fade away, her friend's stare focusing itself on the cup filled with her blood.

A few soldiers had even caught a glimpse at what they were doing and had stopped in their activities to observe them.

"Here you go." said Abraxas with a smile as she handed Wintorra the cup.

She took it and looked at the blood with a tinge of doubt in her gaze before she gulped and raised the glass to her lips. "Cheers."

She closed her eyes and swallowed the strange tasting liquid in one go, its salty taste making her shiver and cough a few times when she had finished drinking. Once Abraxas got the glass back from her they both waited in silence for any noticeable changes with Wintorra, but when none came they assumed that it must've not worked.

"Well, it was worth the attempt. Just don't make me ever do something weird like that again." said Wintorra with a wink at Abraxas before, all of a sudden, she gasped and collapsed to her knees.

A huge burst of power had suddenly exploded within her and had paralyzed her instantly, causing her to lose all feeling in her body when Abraxas' blood began the fusion with her own. She hunched over and clenched her eyes shut, seemingly in pain, which caused Abraxas to be at her side in a heartbeat to try and figure out what was wrong.

"Wintorra! Are you okay?!"

"I'm f-fine...it just...caught me off guard…" she grunted through labored breaths as she picked herself back up and wiped away some saliva from her lips.

When Abraxas got a good look of her after her little episode she gasped and pointed a finger at Wintorra's chest, her friend looking down and doing the same when she saw a black tattoo manifest on her skin just above her cleavage.

"And your eye, it's different!" exclaimed Abraxas.

"What about my eye?!"

The Danger Beast created an ice mirror and held it up to her friend's face, the reflection surprising Wintorra even more when she realized Abraxas was right. As a result of her blood fusing with Abraxas' blood, her left eye's color had morphed to a blood red, the same as Abraxas, and the pupil had thinned out to a slit pupil like a Danger Beast's. Even the sclerae had turned into a dark grey to match her friend's eye.

"Whoa…" murmured Wintorra as she looked at her hands and felt an unrivaled amount of power course through her veins to her fingertips. "This feels so wierd."

"Try to do something." urged Abraxas eagerly, her friend nodding before she closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

As she tapped into her newfound powers small ice horns came into existence on either side of her head, and when she opened her eyes and flung her hand skyward a huge column of ice erupted from the ground a few feet in front of her. Then she held her opposite arm out and encased it in ice, creating a razor sharp blade that she used to cut through the ice column like it was butter.

To finish her demonstration she stopped the falling ice column from hitting the ground and snapped her fingers, dissipating the ice into tiny little snow particles that vanished in the blink of an eye.

Wintorra and Abraxas stared at one another and they both couldn't stop themselves from grinning and laughing out loud at their success. The happy feeling they shared immediately disappeared when they both heard a deafening roar come from far outside the city past the remaining ice dome, which could mean only one thing.

Rex Tyrannos was near, and they were running out of time.

"Wintorra, let's go. I'll round up everyone else and I'll meet you at the front gate."

 **\- Protective Ice Dome Twenty One -**

 **\- Ten Minutes Later -**

Rex Tyrannos proceeded to unleash an enormous stream of fire alongside Tyrvant and the other fire dragons to first weaken the ice dome's exterior. Once a majority had melted away to reveal the second layer Rex Tyrannos stood up on his hind legs and began to pound away at it with his flail-like tail, breaking and cracking the ice barrier until final it broke away and crumbled like all the others before it.

As soon as he stepped through, however, his body stiffened when standing across from him a few hundred yards away was Abraxas and the other surviving ice dragons. No one else was with them, so he assumed the rest of the human army had returned to Glacies to defend the city if it came down to it.

"How noble." he thought as Tyrvant and the others joined his side.

There were six of them, and standing with Abraxas was three ice dragons. They outnumbered them, but he could see that look of fierce determination in his opposite's eye. She wasn't going to let him pass by without a fight.

" **So...we finally meet, Scourge of the North.** " he said to the female dragon, Abraxas grinning at him.

"Greetings, Rex Tyrannos. It's an honor to meet someone of your caliber in person after heading about all of your exploits."

" **I thank you. You yourself are quite famous as well. I just wish we could have met under different circumstances, but as you can see, this is a time of war, and we chose our sides.** "

Abraxas nod her head solemnly in agreement and sighed, her own feelings about their allegiances coming up. "Indeed. Seven long years we have been at eachother's throats...seven long years.I have lost a lot of my family, and I see that you have as well. I pray that their journey to the next life was a safe one."

" **Same to your kin as well. To be honest, Scourge, this war has drained me, and I feel nothing but sorrow for my people and the losses they have suffered. Allow me to propose a wager.** "

"Go on."

" **Let us end this battle once and for all. I will order my men to stand down, and we shall engage in single combat alongside our strongest ally. If you are declared the victor, I will surrender myself to your forces. If I win, then you shall do the same to me. If the either situation occurs, the victor must swear no harm will come to their allies. Does that seem fair to you?** "

Abraxas lingered on the offer for a few, thinking about what could happen if she accepted the offer or not. If she did, their duel would offer a swift end to their fight and spare the lives of many on both sides. If she did not, then their fight would continue and lead to only more needless death and destruction.

" _I cannot bear to watch any more people die…_ "

"Very well, I accept. Choose your ally." she replied, Rex Tyrannos nodding his head once in approval and then turning to look at Tyrvant.

They shared no words and with that, Rex Tyrannos and Tyrvant stood side by side as they always had while the other dragons stepped away alongside the dragon general's soldiers to give them space.

" **Now you, Scourge.** "

Abraxas stepped aside and both Rex Tyrannos and Tyrvant were blown away when from behind the ice dragon walked up a human female with a large red sword and blue hair. Her right eye was closed for some unknown reason, but just from the look on her face and the posture she had, Rex Tyrannos had a deep feeling in the pit of his stomach that told him she was not one to trifle with.

"I choose my closest friend, Wintorra." said Abraxas as her wings unfolded and she hunkered down on her hind legs, prepared to pounce. "Prepare yourself, King of Beasts! I will not hold back!"

" **Show me your strength, Scourge of the North, and I will meet it in kind!** " bellowed Rex Tyrannos at the top of his lungs before the two dragons leaped at one another and commenced their brawl. Tyrvant growled and charged at Wintorra with her teeth bared, and it was only when she had gotten within striking distance did the woman open her other eye and unleashed a shockwave of strength so powerful it even drew the attention of the dragon general himself.

"What is this strength? From a human? How?!" he asked before Abraxas rammed her fist into his jaw and knocked him back several yards.

"Wintorra has become something the world has never seen before. By ingesting my blood…" she started before Wintorra spread her arms apart and created two elegant-looking wings of ice from her back and took to the skies, her gaze set upon her opponent. "She has become the first hybrid of Man and Danger Beast."

"Hageltauchen!" yellowed out Wintorra at the top of her lungs, Tyrvant and Rex Tyrannos gasping when titanic shards of ice formed from thin around around her, their size easily the same as the dragon general.

Tyrvant flew to the side to avoid the ice shards as Wintorra flung them down at her, their enormous husks smashing into the frozen earth and creating giant craters that matched their size. Meanwhile Abraxas had attacked Rex Tyrannos yet again, the two dragons trading blow for blow with fist and claw and tail for superiority. Rex Tyrannos dodged a swing from the ice dragon's tail and sucked in a breath before unleashing a torrent of fire at Abraxas.

She responded in kind by blowing out an ice stream from her own mouth that matched his fire for a good while until he began to overpower her. Wintorra noticed this out of the corner of her eye and growled under her breath, but she was forced to look away when Tyrvant took to the skies after her.

Tyrvant blew out some fire at her but she was able to avoid it easily enough thanks to her small size and agility, and when the stream had dissipated she gripped her sword tightly and rushed the dragon. When the red blade struck Tyrvant's hand when she raised it to stop her, she quickly discovered it would be pointless to continue using it since it hardly made a dent in the Danger Beast's scales.

" _Plan B, I suppose._ " she thought to herself when she retreated a good distance and clapped her hands together.

Huge shards of ice formed on either side of her again and she threw an arm towards her opponent, huge cracks lancing out from the center of mass for each shard as it broke apart on command.

"Eis Drach Sturm!" she said, the ice shards suddenly firing off wave upon wave of razor-sharp icicles like machine guns.

Tyrvant took off flying as fast as she could, the icicles following her through every maneuver she used to try and avoid them, and only when she started to use her fire to melt the frozen projectiles was she able to breath easier. When she was able to get rid of the icicles she turned to engage Wintorra, but found that the entire technique was a distraction for her to fly towards her friend to help her against Rex Tyrannos.

Her ice was about to give out against the dragon general's when just in the nick of time Wintorra flew in, her entire left leg encased in dense ice, and smashed her foot into Rex Tyrannos' jaw with enough force to send him rolling across the ground a few times. Wintorra pressed her advantage against him by landing on the ground and slapping her palms against the frozen earth, the very land itself beginning to rumble.

"Großes Grauhorn!"

Rex Tyrannos rolled to the side when huge razor sharp horns of ice emerged from the ground where he had been laying, the dragon realizing they could have very well managed to injure him if he had not moved. He didn't have any time to breath easy when Wintorra came at him again with two hunks of ice levitating around her, which gave Abraxas a chance to recover and turn her attention to Tyrvant.

When the female fire dragon reached her Abraxas sidestepped her fireblast and countered with a direct ice stream that froze her left wing entirely, forcing her to land. The ice dragon then assaulted her with a series of brutal slashes with her claws and tail, her smaller stature allowing her to keep out of reach of Tyrvant's own claws and tail.

"I won't let you take over our home!" roared Abraxas as she tore into Tyrvant, one of her claws dragging itself through her scales across her left eye and leaving a deep gash that would most certainly scar over.

She whirled around her tail and the fire dragon retaliated by grabbing onto the appendage and used her superior strength to hurl Abraxas over her head and onto the ground behind her. The impact stirred up some snow that hid her body for a few moments, the ice dragon groaning a little before Tyrvant grabbed her by a wing and pulled her back over.

She bellowed in pain when Tyrvant rammed her fist into her unprotected gut and then bit down with her teeth into the base of her neck, her cry catching the attention of Wintorra.

"Stay away from her!" she snarled as she brought her right arm and balled her fingers into a fist. "Verschlingen Weiss!"

Tyrvant was about to slash at Abraxas again before all of a sudden the ice particles in the air around her solidified all at once, entombing her within an ultra-dense cast of ice up to the very bottom of her head. Abraxas grinned a little as she removed herself out from underneath the ice dragon, turning to look at Wintorra and give her a thumbs up.

Wintorra returned it, but that simple movement was enough to give Rex Tyrannos time to recover and fight back against her.

" **Do not turn your back on me!** " he snarled as he reared back and smashed his open hand into her body, sending her flying back at breakneck speeds.

Luckily Abraxas flew up and caught her before she could strike the inner wall of the ice dome and lowered her back to the ground, since the blow had completely disintegrated her ice wings.

"Are you okay?" she asked, the woman wiping some blood from her lips and chuckling.

"I'm fine. I created an ice barrier to take most of the hit at the last second. But he is no joke, I haven't been able to land a meaningful blow on him yet." replied Wintorra.

The two readied themselves to fight against the dragon general with their allies watching them from the sidelines, the fire dragons and ice dragons silently cheering on their respective leaders.

" **You two have definitely proven to be the most formidable opponent I have ever faced, especially you, Human. You have amazed me with that strength of yours.** "

Rex Tyrannos then crouched down low on all fours and folded up his wings, his eyes narrowing to the point they were almost closed as licks of flame began to dance through his teeth.

" **However, I am ending this now.** " he said when all of a sudden his skin started to shimmer, the action causing Wintorra and Abraxas to gasp.

Right before their very eyes, the dragon general's body suddenly lit itself on fire, turning him into something more similar to a fire demon then a dragon. He roared and charged straight at them, the very appearance of him sending chills running up and down their spines that paralyzed them almost instantly.

However, Wintorra quickly swallowed her fear and mustered up as much power as she could to perform a technique that she had thought of, but hadn't actually tried yet. She was still getting used to her newfound powers, but considering the situation they were in, she could afford to take a risk.

A swirling snowstorm picked up around her as she raised both of her hands up to the tattoo on her chest and closed her eyes, the dragon general raising an eyebrow in suspicion of the movement.

" _I hope this works!_ "

"Mahapadma." said Wintorra calmly, the bright blue ball of energy that had come to life in between her hands rapidly expanding out in the blink of an eye to cover anything with a soft blue glow.

She opened her eyes and grinned at her technique's success when she saw that Rex Tyrannos was frozen in space and time, the fire dragon who was rumored to withstand even the coldest and harshest winters of the north helpless to stop her technique. Wintorra approached the dragon calmly, several tiny ice crystals beginning to float around her as she prepared to bring an end to the dragon's tenure as general once and for all.

She kneeled and gently placed her hand against the ground a few feet away from the dragon's head, her eyes flashing for a split second when several massive ice horns erupted from the ground and pierced through the dragon's right shoulder, left thigh and right side of his abdomen.

When she finished she stood back up and snapped her fingers, manually ending the technique and catching Rex Tyrannos totally off guard when space and time unfroze and he found himself wounded, bleeding and hurting.

" **H-How did you…?** "

"I froze space and time. Since I couldn't land a hit on you while you were guarding, I decided to do it when you couldn't protect yourself." explained Wintorra while Abraxas made her way over to them and grinned at their enemy.

Rex Tyrannos tried to free himself but found that the ice horns had been pierced into some of his joints, which greatly limited his movements and made it extremely painful to try as well. It was only after seeing the determined expression on Wintorra's face that he accepted defeat and sighed heavily while relaxing his beaten body.

" **Very well, I concede.** "

Wintorra nod her head and made a flicking motion with her hand and wrist, the ice around Tyrvant suddenly dissipated and freeing the female dragon from its confines. She walked over to where Rex Tyrannos lay at the same time the other fire and ice dragons did and with their help they got the dragon general back on his feet, he and Abraxas staring at one another the whole time.

"So, our deal?" she asked of him.

" **I may be your enemy, but I stay true to my word. I surrender.** " he said before he looked away from Abraxas and over to Wintorra, who was standing atop her friend's shoulder. " **And you, human, what was your name again?** "

"Wintorra." she replied.

Rex Tyrannos nod his head and gave her a toothy smile as he placed a closed fist to his chest and beat it softly a few times as a sign of respect. " **Wintorra, I will remember your name and tenacity for many years to come. It was an honor to fight against you.** "

 **\- The Bastion, Far South -**

 **\- Two Days Later -**

"So...it would seem that Rex Tyrannos was defeated by Glacies…"

"What do you plan on doing, Lord Mephistopheles?" asked Garmr with a grin as the armored Danger Beasts tore the rolled up parchment and stood up from his throne, his eyes set upon a target far away from him.

"It's time I take a more… _direct_ role in this war."


	60. Prelude to Devastation

A/N God dammit It took me a while to get this chapter out, I really am sorry for that. Unexpectedly I started working again at the Architectural Firm I worked at as an intern so the speak over the summer again now that I'm off college, so once again I have constrained working times for chapters. I'll try to get them out as fast as I can, so I once again thank you for sticking around and waiting. Anyways, moving on. First off guys I'd like to say here recently I watched the anime **Puella Magi Madoka Magica** , a.k.a **Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica** , and the third movie for It that acted as a sequel to the anime, " **Rebellion** ". It's not something I normally watch, but...watching PMMM destroyed any and all remnants of my heart and soul that I thought I had left after watching Clannad.

I shit you not, it wrecked me. I have no soul any more, it's just a black hole of sorrow and despair now. That show was so sad…but anyways, despite the crippling sadness I now possess, watching it alongside remembering some scenes from Naruto and Dragon Ball Z Kai...I now have some ideas...gruesome ideas...khehehehehehe.

*Takes deep breath* but anyways, I highly recommend watching PMMM and its movie sequel because it is a **REALLY** good anime. The story is just exceptional, and the characters were really great too. Trust me.

Anyways guys, I have nothing else left to report, so leave a fav and review and I'll see you in the next chapter.

* * *

 **Chapter 59 - Prelude to Devastation**

 **\- Kingdom of Avalonnis -**

 **\- One Week Later -**

"Status report."

"A large enemy army is approaching our borders sir. It's led by a man in dark maroon armor." replied a soldier to his commanding officer, a knight dressed in white armor.

He had removed his helmet for the time being and had set it down on the desk he was standing in front of in the office belonging to the chief protector of the kingdom. News of the defeat of Rex Tyrannos and his army in the north had spread like wildfire to the remaining human forces and their allies, which served as a huge moral boost for them all since they had been losing for quite some time.

" _And of course, to retaliate, the enemy leader himself and his own army are coming to wipe out the commanders of our forces. Typical…_ " thought the knight.

"Okay, spread the word to all regimen commanders to prepare for battle. Also put out a call to all able bodied men in the Kingdom that if they wish to defend their life, liberty, and their Kingdom, they are to meet here in half an hour." relayed the knight to his subordinate, another knight standing next to him raising a hand inquisitively.

"And what of the citizens sir?"

"They are to gather in the central citadel and remain their for their own safety. Our city and very way of life is under threat, so we must do everything in our power to protect it."

The two knights standing in front of him saluted their commander and left the room, the white knight picking up his helmet and leaving a few seconds after them. Instead of turning right however he turned left and continued further into the depths of the citadel, the location in mind located within its deepest recesses.

After walking for at least five minutes he arrived at the citadel's inner most sanctum, a cut off room that was home to the commander-in-chief of the human and Danger Beast forces opposing their enemy.

They would probably already know who would be coming to knock on their doorsteps, but it was customary for him to go and inform his commanding officer of this information. He approached the iron door guarding the entrance into the room and knocked on it three times, waiting for whoever was inside to call out and permit his entry beyond the door.

"Come in." he heard from within, the knight grabbing the single door knob and turning it until it clicked.

He walked through the doorway into a large circular chamber with candles lining the wall around its entire circumference, their flickering light coupled with the many more hanging from the chandelier above giving the room a comfortable feel despite its blank interior. The only furniture inside was a table, a pair of couches and chairs used for leisure, and an extravagant bed with some light colored veils.

Upon his entrance a woman sitting with her back turned toward him in one of the chairs moved her shoulders a little and glanced back at him. Her red and purple eyes, like every other time he saw them, seemed to entrance him and draw him closer to where the woman sat and sit across from her in another chair.

"Hello Lucius."

"Madam Commander." said the now identified knight with a bow, his courtesy flattering the black-haired woman.

"Oh Lucius, what did I tell you?" she said with a chuckle as she crossed her legs over and set her elbow down on one of the chair's arms. "When we're alone like this, you can call me Noctis."

Lucius laughed a little as he rubbed the back of his neck and grinned out of embarrassment, the female sharing in his laughter for a few seconds before they both relaxed in their seats and started the discussion the former had come for.

"Even though you probably already know they're here, I still have to tell you that the enemy are nearing Avalonnis."

Noctis nod her head solemnly and sighed. "Yes...I do know. I also know that it's _him_ leading it."

"Are you sure you'll be able to lead us? If you can't, then I'll happily take control of the situation for you ma'am."

Noctis raised her hand so he would stop speaking and shook her head, the smile she had turning into a frown that matched her dark appearance. She had a reputation for being the most caring person to ever walk the face of the earth, her motherly and caring tendency enough to soothe the heart of anyone, Danger Beast or Human. Even among the enemy forces they had subdued they didn't mind being defeated by her since they knew they would be forgiven and treated not like prisoners of war or lesser beings.

But as soon as she dropped that smile and became serious, or even angered, she was hell on earth and everyone listened to her. So when Lucius saw that glare she gave him, he immediately closed his mouth and forgot the idea that she wasn't going to fight.

"Sorry…"

"It's okay, I don't blame you for looking out for me, but out of all the battles I've fought, this is one I must _absolutely_ partake in." replied Noctis, her caring smile returning again.

"I am the only one who stands a chance against him, so if we have any hope of ending this war before any more innocents die, _I_ have to be the one to fight him. Besides, we cannot afford to lose our strongest warrior in battle."

Their talk about that matter ended there, but before either of them left to prepare for the enemy's arrival Noctis poured some tea for both of them and they shared talks of their normal lives. They were close friends and either of them would trust the other with their life regardless of the situation, so they often held these kinds of discussions when they had free time.

They were gonna need it especially before the coming battle.

 **\- Kingdom of Babylon, Southern Territories -**

The Kingdom of Babylon, once a bustling southern city inspired by the people who lived there, had now been reduced to desolate wasteland populated by the ruined buildings of the kingdom and the endless waves of sand that had slowly taken over the kingdom. However, even though the city itself had been wiped out by Mephistopheles, the people had managed to survive and were still fighting to regain control of what remained of their home against hostile forces.

Their forces were small compared to the Danger Beasts under the command of a ruthless general nicknamed the "Supreme War God", but they weren't pushovers either, and had been a thorn in his backside for quite some time.

"Good fighting today everyone! We were able to get back east district, but we still have a long way to go."

The leader of the forces holding up inside the desert ruin of a city was a bombastic and charismatic leader not commonly found among humans. Despite the situation they were faced with, she remained optimistic all the time and inspired her soldiers to fight on through the odds against them.

Her personality also matched her manner of dress, which broadcasted her presence on the battlefield like a raging inferno that could be seen for miles. She wore very revealing cloths in the form of a tube top that seemed to barely contain her large bust, a silver arm bracelet around her left arm and a scarf around her neck. Hanging from her waist was a red sash, and covering her right leg was black and gold stocking while her left had a grey vambrace.

She also had silvery hair that was braided into two waist-length ponytails and, to make her appearance even more alluring the two bangs had a bright red color to them, and two tufts of her hair pointed upward like horns or ears. As a result of being out in the sun her skin had tanned to a light golden brown color and she was not afraid to flaunt herself and her looks around even in the middle of a battle.

Her name was Azura, and she was the most beautiful woman any of them had ever seen, and the black tattoos she had covering her left thigh made her even more unique.

However no one even dared to try and flirt with her because of her extraordinarily tall and strong bodyguard, a man by the name of Kanon. He stood at least six and a half feet tall and was dressed entirely in full-body armor reminiscent of a samurai's, complete with the kasa resting atop his head. Even his face was covered by the armor, showing off only his eyes and a small portion of his face.

Underneath the armor covering his face, both sides of his head and the top of his head was a red cloth, and just underneath that over his forehead he wore a black bandanna. Covering both of his hands were large black gloves, and over his armor he wore a tattered gi that was white with a red sash around his waist.

He hardly ever spoke, but when he did speak it held great meaning and often helped their commander decide important strategic positions that would enable them to win. To their enemies, he was a giant capable of wreaking havoc with his monstrous strength, but to them, he was their gentle giant and loyal friend.

While her men relaxed at their encampment deep beneath the city after a day's worth of fighting in the sandy and rubble-filled streets, Azura and Kanon retired to their own personal section that they shared with one another.

"What will we do now, Azura?" asked Kanon in a deep tone, the man sitting himself down on a barrel covered with a crude blanket and removing his conical hat.

"What we've been doing for the past three years, fight against our enemies to win back control of our city. If we keep holding out, we'll get help eventually...I know it." said Azura with a grin oozing determination, her attitude infecting Kanon and making him chuckle.

"Hehe...I guess so."

 **\- Kingdom of Avalonnis -**

Noctis stabbed the tip of her spear into the stone walkway built into the Kingdom's protective wall, her personal guards and Lucius standing right next to her as she observed what would be the battlefield. Off in the distance at the crest of a hill overlooking the valley surrounding Avalonnis was the enemy, a massive army consisting of Danger Beasts either in their human forms or as themselves.

She looked from one end of the army to the other until her eye caught something standing in the direct center of the large mass of bodies, the faint maroon color the only marker she needed to know who it was.

"Mephisto…" she whispered under her breath, her mind giving her the idea that her lover was having the same thought she was.

Apprehension and doubt. These were the feelings she hoped they shared. She quickly disregarded these emotions and steeled her gaze and body, the soldiers under her orders getting into their defensive emplacements near the foot of the wall. They had their shields, spears, and swords at the ready to defend their nation and loved ones even into their dying breath.

" _The human spirit...it really is something special._ " thought Noctis with a smile before she glanced at Lucius and instantly remembered something highly important that would most likely dampen his own spirit.

"Lucius, as much as I know you want to fight here, there's actually somewhere else that requires your assistance."

"W-What?" sputtered the knight, his grip on his sword and shield faltering.

"Down in the south, there are resistance fighters in the ruins of Babylon that are holding back against the forces led by the Supreme War God. All relief efforts have been taken out by his forces, so the humans and Danger Beasts trapped there have been fighting a war of attrition for several years now." explained Noctis before she snapped her fingers, her personal guards stepping back and leaving them.

"But Madam Commander-"

"Lucius, it's fine, I can handle myself here. What's more important is that you go to Babylon and save those trapped survivors. I don't want to live with the fact that people died when there was a chance to save them and we didn't take it." said Noctis to cut him off, the female Danger Beast turning to look at him. "Please, Lucius, you are Avalonnis' strongest knight, the only person capable of doing this. I am ordering you as Supreme Commander of the Human-Danger Beast Coalition to free the citizens of Babylon from the Supreme War God."

Lucius wanted to say something else, but with the look on her face coupled with his sense of loyalty and trust for her and her judgement, he couldn't possibly argue with her. He sighed and slid his sword back into its sheath before hanging his shield on the sash over his back, his eyes flashing with a little twinkle.

"Well, there's no use in saying no when you're like that. Very well, I'll take my best men and head out immediately Madam Commander. As soon as I'm done there I'll come back, I promise." he gave her a salute and then, rather then taking the normal route, he jumped clear off the wall and landed next to the horse Noctis had prepared for him.

He made quick work at rounding up those who were willing to follow him, and when everything was set they left the city from the entrance hidden from the view of Mephistopheles and his army. If they were heading out to another location they didn't want to draw attention to themselves, and they especially didn't want to let their enemy know that the greatest warriors in service to Avalonnis had just left.

" _I'll be back as soon as I can Noctis! I swear it!_ " he thought before he kicked his heels into the horse Danger Beast he was riding, the creature entering a gallop far greater in speed then a normal horse.

Noctis, after watching Lucius disappear into the nearby forest with his men, returned her attention to Mephistopheles and leaped off the wall herself to join her men on the front lines for what she hoped would be the last battle of the war.

" _My beloved...I'm sorry for what must happen next._ "

"Prepare yourselves! We must hold out against the enemy for as long as possible until reinforcements from the North arrive!"

No more then five minutes after she called out to her men Mephistopheles began his assault on Avalonnis, his massive Danger Beast stocked army going toe to toe with the human and Danger Beast army led by Noctis. The battle quickly erupted into a war of its own, the two sides throwing everything that they had at one another for a grand total of seven long days of continuous fighting.

And throughout the entire battle, Noctis and Mephistopheles were going against one another with their full strength to try and defeat the other.

On the outside, they were battle-hardened warriors, but on this inside, each lover was feeling the pain of fighting their former significant other with tooth and nail. And all the while Lucius had not yet arrived at Babylon and was worrying the entire time about the condition his friends and allies were in.

If only he had known.

 **\- Unclaimed Territory, Kingdom of Straelka -**

 **\- Present Day -**

Even though it had been a full day since learning from Jacqueline that Roman, their savior, was her son, the truth was still shocking to Solomon, Camilla and Morgan. What made it even weirder was that all of them had no idea how it could have happened, since it was just basic knowledge that two women couldn't have a child together even if they tried.

So, they all came to the same conclusion. Who was the father, and where exactly was he?

After the royal family finished eating with their hosts, they remained at the dining table to start talking of how they would take back Straelka.

"So...what's the situation?" asked Solomon when Kahfka sat back down at the table and rested her elbows on its finished surface.

"Nothing's changed, really. The Danger Beasts guarding the city are still there, and there's little to no chance of getting close without getting spotted. Even I had a hard time getting close because of the bird Danger Beast flying over head." she explained with a sigh as she glanced at the Kaiser. "To be perfectly honest, if we're gonna be able to take back Straelka, we're gonna need help, especially since those four Danger Beasts were able to beat all three of you."

"That hurts." said Morgan with a glum look on his face, the former assassin and Jacqueline giggling at him.

"We don't mean for it to be hurtful, it's the truth. We're all incredibly strong, that's undeniable, but the fact of the matter is that those Danger Beasts have an advantage in size, brute strength, and if what you said is true then they can heal themselves just like how I can with the ability I gained from Devil's Heart and you two with Vile Blood Curse." said Jacqueline while pointing toward Solomon and Camilla, who nod their heads in understanding.

So the only thing they could do really was wait and watch. What made the situation even worse was Kahfka went on to tell them that the Danger Beast capable of breathing ice had traveled to the other cities of the Kingdom and had entrapped them within ice domes as well, meaning they were entirely alone. They would be getting no backup from the Straelkan Army...they were the only ones that would be able to free the nation from the grips of their Danger Beast enemies.

It seemed to be a daunting task, but there was a glimmer a hope. If by some chance they were able to get a message to Tatsumi, Esdeath, or anyone in the Empire about what had happened, they would be able to get the help they needed to liberate Straelka.

"Wait a minute, Kahfka, you can fly with the help of your ice, right?" asked Camilla.

"Yeah, why?

"Maybe you can fly over the ocean to the Empire and figure out what's going on over there and hopefully bring back some assistance here." she explained to Kahfka, who glanced at Jacqueline and raised an eyebrow to see what she would say.

"I mean, that could work, but…"

"I'll go with her. My Teigu allows me to fly as well." blurted out Morgan, his outburst drawing the attention of his parents first before Kahfka and Jacqueline.

"Are you sure about doing that? What if something happens to you?" they both asked, their son smirking as he stood up from his chair and proudly raised a hand to his chest.

"Mom, Dad, you do realize who you're talking to right?"

Their expressions softened and Camilla averted her gaze away from him, Solomon standing up and resting a hand on Morgan's shoulder. He knew what he was going to say or at least something close to it, so he waited for his father to gather his thoughts first and speak his mind before he would state his argument.

"Morgan, your mother and I are just worried that you won't come back to us. I understand that you've been over there before, but...you're our only son. We wouldn't know what to do if we lost you."

Before Morgan could speak Kahfka suddenly appeared by his side with a cocky grin on her face and crossed her arms, winking at Solomon while motioning with a head nod to his son.

"Don't worry, I'll be sure to keep an eye on him."

"Can we trust you?" asked Camilla with a straight face, the underlying threat in her question reaching Kahfka and telling her she meant business.

"Yes, I promise. We'll be back before you know it." she replied, the Kaiserin staring at her intently for a few more seconds before she nod her head and agreed to the plan.

Solomon chuckled and pat his son on the shoulder a few times before he and Camilla left the dining room. Morgan turned to face Kahfka and she playfully tapped him on the nose while pointing to the clock hanging on the nearby wall with her other hand, which had just passed by five o'clock.

"You might want to get some sleep now, because we're leaving at midnight. Okay?"

"Sure thing."


	61. Ride of the Four Horsemen

A/N Welp, everyone, we're nearing the end of our story about the Great Danger Beast-Human War, I'm gonna go ahead and say this now. And back in present times Kahfka and Morgan are planning to head to the Empire to seek out Morgan's friends. Things are starting to pick up motion again, and that means more action and suspense that I hope will keep you guys hooked.

Also, in other news, there is a small possibility that I will write another Akame ga Kill fanfic that will be entirely separate from *A Different Path, one that will be more in line with the Manga/Anime but will of course feature new OCs created by yours truly. It's still up on the drawing board, so there's a lot that can change with it, and it may never come into fruition. I'm hoping it will though because it's sounding really good in my head, and the characters I have drawn up look really friggin cool. After this chapter I will also be creating the character pages for **Noctis** , **Abraxas** , **Lucius** , **Wintorra** , **Azura** , and **Kanon** , so be looking for those on the wiki. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 60 - Ride of the Four Horsemen**

 **\- White Sand Beach, Taiyang's Library Domain -**

Lucena walked alone along the white sandy beach bordering the glassy desert surrounding the entrance to Taiyang's library, her mind going over the recent bits and pieces she had just heard from Taiyang. She, and everyone else with her, had learned that the knight Lucius had arrived at Babylon just in time to rescue Azura, Kanon and the rest of their forces from a surprise attack by enemy forces and successfully managed to drive them away from Babylon long enough for them to escape with Lucius and his knights.

Granted it was painful for her to leave behind the city she had fought so long to protect, but with some convincing and reassuring words from Lucius, Azura agreed to return with him back to Avalonnis. They rode as fast as they could back to the Kingdom, but in a cruel twist of fate, they arrived at the worst possible moment.

Lucius, with his own two eyes, saw Noctis be run through by her own lover's sword and killed her, Mephistopheles then retreating with his forces soon afterwards in order to regroup and return with an even larger force at a later time to finally wipe them out for good. Everyone who had known or heard of Noctis entered a state of grief like no other, her kindness and compassion for anyone that had been legendary throughout the land...there was no chance of it ever coming back again.

Her death had been a huge loss for the Human-Danger Beast Coalition, and the entire day had been spent mourning her passing.

" _To think Mephistopheles would be so cold-hearted as to kill his own significant other and bat not a single eyelash toward her memory. It makes me sick._ " thought Lucena with a growl as she kicked some white sand with her bare foot.

She sat down in the sand and smiled when the cold sea water washed up ashore and touched her toes, the slight chill she got reminding her of when she had gone with her parents, Maya, Juno, Wave, Akame and Hikari to a beach close to Wave's hometown. Her smile quickly faded and she drew her knees up to her chest, a sigh escaping her lips when she remembered Hikari and her abrupt departure from the Empire.

" _Hikari...I miss you…_ "

The soft sea breeze blew through her hair and across her exposed skin, her eyes closing shut for a few moments as she listened to the sounds of the world all around her. That's when she heard something walking through the sand toward her, and she turned her head around, expecting it to be one of her sisters or parents. Instead, she was completely caught off guard by the long black hair and the warm smile she saw from the person standing a few yards away from where she sat.

"Hi Lucena...um...it's been a while, huh?" said Hikari with a nervous laugh.

It had taken her a good amount of time to muster up the courage to meet with Lucena face to face after how she had left the Imperial Capital, so she was afraid how the Great General would react to seeing her again. A few seconds of silence existed after she had spoken before Lucena picked herself up out of the sand and turned to face her close friend, her eyes as wide as they could be in surprise.

Hikari waited for her to start yelling or show some form of aggression toward her for leaving, but any and all thoughts and doubts about their meeting taking a sour turn vanished completely when, without a single word, Lucena closed the distance between them and threw her arms around her. She gasped a little at how tightly Lucena embraced her, and she got a taste of how she really felt about seeing her again when she shuddered and actually shed some tears.

"H-Hikari...I missed you so much…"

"I did too, Lucena." replied Hikari when Lucena picked her head off of her shoulder and looked her dead in the eyes.

She leaned forward and Hikari met her lips with her own, the kiss they shared filled with overwhelming amounts of love and passion that they had kept under wraps for the longest time. After they shared these precious moments with one another, Lucena withdrew from her and placed both hands on her shoulders and looked her over with a careful eye to see if there was anything wrong with her.

"Where did you go? Why did you go? Do you have any idea how worried I was?!" she asked frantically, HIkari's smile dropping when the questions she had been fearing finally came out. "Ah, who cares right now anyways, I'm just glad your back!"

"About that, Lucena...I can't stay."

Lucena froze and she let go of Hikari while she developed a confused expression. "What? Why?"

"I came here to tell you something about the Danger Beast you're here with, Taiyang Xiao Long."

"What about him?"

"Don't trust him *whatsoever." stated Hikari darkly, her tone putting off Lucena somewhat at how serious she was.

"Why do you say that?" asked Lucena, who was starting to become suspicious of Hikari's reasoning behind her claim. "Does it have something to do with Devil's Heart? Do you still have it?"

"No, and no, it's...Mephisto-"

"Hold up, Mephisto? As in Mephistopheles, the guy that tried to turn humans into slaves?! That guy?!" exclaimed Lucena, Hikari nodding her head a couple of times to confirm. "Why are you with him?!"

"Lucena, please listen to me, whatever Taiyang said about him it's-"

"You do realize he killed his lover, right? He didn't care about their relationship and didn't shed a single tear! There's no reason for you to believe what he says!"

Hikari growled under her breath and took a single step forward, saying, "Mephisto isn't the bad guy here! He told me everything that happened, and that the one not to trust is Taiyang!"

"On what grounds? Why should I not believe a Danger Beast who has never raised a finger in anger towards anyone and has never participated in an armed conflict?" demanded Lucena while crossing her arms, the fire Hikari had behind her words extinguishing itself.

"W-Well, um…"

"Go on, tell me."

"If I told you, you wouldn't believe me!" yelled Hikari angrily, her outburst catching Lucena off guard and actually scaring her a little. "There's your answer, okay? If I told you the truth, you still wouldn't believe me."

Lucena blinked a few times before her shocked look morphed into a scowl as she brushed past Hikari and started to walk away. "Then I guess we can agree to disagree. I'm done talking."

"Wait, Lucena!" said Hikari desperately to try and stop her, which succeeded to some extent. "I...I…"

"What is it?" asked Lucena with a harsh tone, Hikari sniffing a little when she started to cry.

"I don't want to end up fighting you...I love you…" she said with all of her strength, Lucena's scowl dropping for but a moment before she quickly turned away to hide her own tears.

She didn't want to fight Hikari either, in fact she dreaded the idea of going against her. If there was another way that avoided the two of them engaging in a fight to the death she would take it in a heartbeat. But considering the current situation...there was little to chance of that happening, which made it all the more heartbreaking for her.

"I'm going to kill Mephistopheles, Hikari, and if you get in my way...I'm gonna have to hurt you. I'm sorry." she said while on the verge of breaking down, her feet carrying her away before Hikari could see for herself just how much pain she was in.

Hikari wiped away her own tears and sprinted away in the opposite direction towards the south, wanting to get as far away from the beach and glass desert as possible. Her heart was in pieces as a result of the meeting with Lucena, so the only thing she wanted to do was run away as fast as she could.

Lucena did the same thing, and she didn't stop until she had returned to Taiyang's library and found a secluded aisle of books before she collapsed with her back against the bookshelf and started to cry silently. She just wanted to be alone and not speak with anyone.

Unfortunately for her this would not be granted, and as if on que Selena walked by the book aisle and would have moved on if not for catching Lucena's hair out of the corner of her eye. She jogged over to her sister and sat next to her, the very presence of her flesh and blood enough to calm Lucena down to the point she could answer Selena's questions. She told her about meeting Hikari and what they talked about, Selena listening to every word and listening patiently for her to finish before she would offer her own insight on the situation.

"I don't know what to do…" whimpered Lucena through the tears of a broken heart. "She's my friend, but she's also an enemy...I don't want to hurt hur...I-I love her..."

Selena shushed her softly and ran a hand through her hand gently with like a mother would to its child. Despite her being the younger sibling between the two, Lucena would often go to her if she needed guidance since she would always listen to her. That's why their bond as sisters was so incredibly strong, Lucena knew and trusted her with knowledge of her feelings and problems, and that she would also offer her own advice on how to deal with them.

"Lucena...it's going to be okay. Hikari undoubtedly feels the same way, and I'm sure there's a very good reason as to why she said what she said." said Selena in a caring tone.

"Y-You believe her?" asked Lucena, her sister using a finger to wipe away her tears.

"I'm not saying I believe her, but there's nothing wrong with keeping up our guards in the off chance that Taiyang isn't being entirely truthful with us. How does that sound?" said Selena with a smile, Lucena sniffing a final time before she nod her head and smiled too.

"Come here, you goofball. I'll stay here with you until Kaminari comes for us."

Selena relaxed her shoulders so that Lucena could rest her head on one and relax, the stress in her body slowly venting itself out with every breath she took. They sat together in silence for a couple of hours, with Lucena even falling into a deep sleep while leaning on Selena's shoulder, and her sister making not a sound so as to not disturb her slumber. When it seemed like she too would end up falling asleep, Kaminari peered down the aisle from around the corner and called for them to return to Taiyang's grotto, so with a little nudge she woke up Lucena and helped her to her feet.

Once everyone met at the bridge crossing on the first floor Lucena took them down to the cave entrance to Taiyang's grotto and awaited the dragon, who had yet to make his appearance. After a few minutes the elder Danger Beast finally emerged from the darkness and cleared his throat, the final portion of his story resting on his lips.

 **\- Several Million Years Ago -**

 **\- Kingdom of Avalonnis -**

Deep within the citadel of the city, inside of the chambers formerly used by Noctis before her passing, sat the surviving leaders of the Human-Danger Beast Coalition thinking over what they should do now in the eve of their supreme leader's death. In her absence some though that the next person to lead should be Lucius, since he was the closest to her, while others believed it would be Abraxas to take control.

Lucius sat next to Azura on one of the couches with Kanon close by, and Wintorra was with Abraxas across from them. They had to come to a conclusion soon, because if they couldn't decide on a leader they would be helpless and disorganized against the army Mephistopheles was gathering to annihilate them once and for all.

"Okay, let's have another vote…" muttered Wintorra as she gazed around at the other gathered military and political officials of both kingdoms. "All in favor of Lucius taking command, raise your hand."

One by one everyone who wanted him as leader raised their hands, which included Azura and Kanon. Wintorra counted up all of the votes and when she committed the number to memory, she asked, "And all in favor of Abraxas?"

The number of votes was tallied and she sighed heavily for fifth time today. It was yet another tie, which meant they still had no idea who would take control of the coalition.

"This is starting to get annoying." she growled under her breath.

All of a sudden the doors were thrown inward and a cloaked individual strided into the room, his face hidden behind a large hood that didn't really help give off an air of friendliness. Almost immediately he bowed his head out of respect for everyone in the room and stared directly at Abraxas, the female Danger Beast catching a glimpse of the glowing red eyes peering out from under the hood and the strange sense of comfort they gave off.

"Sorry to intrude upon all of you, but I believe I have the solution for all of you." said the man in a deep, elderly voice, Abraxas recognizing it almost instantly.

"Taiyang, is that you?"

"Tai-who?" asked Azura as she glanced over her shoulder at the man while Abraxas stood up to go and greet the man she apparently knew.

"Everyone, I'd like to introduce you to a very old friend of mine and all of Danger Beast-kind, Taiyang Xiao Long, the oldest living Danger Beast alive today."

Everyone present in the room gasped at the title, but rather then boast about it the elder humbly bowed again and chuckled. "Yes, that is I. And since I am an advocate for peace and harmony, I could not stand to watch the people of this world wage war on one another any longer. I have a plan that will enable you to finally beat Mephistopheles, however I only wish to speak of it with them."

Taiyang pointed with a single hand at Lucius, Wintorra, Kanon and Azura, the four becoming confused as to the reasoning behind singling them out of the large group of people within the room. Abraxas helped file everyone else out through the doors and once she, Taiyang, Azura, Lucius, Kanon and Wintorra were the only ones left she closed them shut and crossed her arms.

"So, Taiyang, what did you have in mind?"

"It has something to do with what you and young Wintorra did up north to combat Rex Tyrannos and his army." started Taiyang, which served to intrigue everyone even further, especially the ones who had no idea what exactly they did. "Wintorra, if you could please show everyone your abilities, that will give them an understanding of what I intend to do."

Wintorra nod her head once and got up from her seat, stepped away a few feet, and then closed her eyes in order to focus. She snapped her fingers and instantly several ice shards manifested from thin air around her, Lucius, Azura and Kanon all gasping in awe when she started to move them through the air with simple hand motions.

"Wintorra, after ingesting the blood of Abraxas, gained her ice manipulation abilities and can use them willingly. Effectively, she has become a hybrid, possessing both Human and Danger Beast blood." explained Taiyang when Wintorra made the ice disintegrate into tiny particles and walked over to Abraxas.

Lucius, after recovering from the shock, began to analyze the situation and half a second later he figured out why Taiyang had only wanted them. "Then, what you're wanting is…"

"Yes, that is correct. Lucius, Azura, Kanon, you will all join Wintorra in becoming a Human-Danger Beast hybrid and become a fighting force capable of taking on Mephistopheles." revealed Taiyang when from his cloak he procured three vials of blood, one for each of them. "Come, young ones."

Lucius looked at Azura for a few seconds and she shrugged before pushing herself off the couch and bouncing happily over to Taiyang, the Danger Beast handing her a vial of blood that was warmer then the rest.

"This blood came from a species that can willingly produce fire from itself, similar to how Abraxas can procure ice from thin air." said Taiyang after letting go of the vial, Azura's eyes lighting up like a fire in wondrous awe.

Kanon and Lucius made their way over to the Danger Beast and he first handed Kanon a vial of blood he claimed to be from a species known as "Earth-Movers" due to their monstrous brute strength and ability to shape the very surface of the earth. Then he turned to Lucius and, before giving him the vial, he gripped his wrist and stared him directly in the eyes.

"This, young Lucius, is not just any blood. This blood is in fact *my own, so use it well Knight and help bring back peace to these lands." he said cautiously, Lucius nodding his head once.

Taiyang let go of his wrist and vial and then stepped back, motioning with his hands for the three of them to drink the blood. Kanon lifted the blood to his lips first and drank in down in silence, handing back the vial to Taiyang once he was finished and then turning to wait for Azura and Lucius.

"Well, bottoms up I guess." said Lucius with a wink as he downed Taiyang's blood, his action making Azura blush for a few seconds before she followed suite.

Once their blood was gone they waited patiently for anything to happen to them, Wintorra all the while laughing quietly under her breath because she knew that they were about to experience the same rush she felt after consuming Abraxas' blood. Just like she had expected, no more than a few seconds later all three suddenly gasped when they each felt an enormous strength come into existence within them.

Lucius was the first to recover and with a wary gaze at his hand he tried to tap into his newfound power, and was shocked when bolts of lightning started to spark in between his very finger tips. Azura tried the same thing and giggled like a little schoolgirl when a tiny fireball appeared a few inches above the palm of her hand, its gentle glow illuminating her tanned skin. Kanon, after returning to his full height, clenched both of his fists and grinned when the skin turned almost pitch black, its toughness and strength going through the roof beyond any known material.

Also, like Wintorra, each of them experienced an exterior change where one of their eyes, namely Lucius' left eye, Azura's right eye, and Kanon's left eye, developed slit pupils and grey sclerae. The color also changed as well, with Lucius having a red left eye, Azura having a gold right eye, and Kanon with a new yellow eye, which marked the completion of the fusing between their own blood and the foreign Danger Beast blood they had just ingested.

"Welcome to the club guys!" said Wintorra with a grin after they had finished testing out their new abilities, which still fascinated them even after the fourth or fifth time.

"This is exceptional, thank you Taiyang." said Lucius with a bow to their elder, the cloaked Danger Beast returning the gesture.

"The pleasure is mine. Now that you all are ready, I will divulge unto you the location of Mephistopheles' base of operations."

 **\- Thirty Minutes Later -**

"So, we're really gonna go after the head honcho huh?" asked Azura of Lucius as the pair strolled along the southern portion of the kingdom's wall, the light from the setting sun illuminating their faces and the latter's pristine armor.

"Indeed. What we do from here on will determine the fate of Humanity and Danger Beasts." replied Lucius with a sigh, the weight of their task beginning to weigh down on his shoulders.

Azura tapped her toes against the ground a couple of times and glanced up at the knight, smiling at the determined expression he had on his face that greatly contrasted the look of grief he had earlier. He was ready for what was to come, and she couldn't help but feel inspired to follow his example and completely disregard the nigh-infinite amount of risks that would come from taking on the leader of their enemy.

He gave off an aura of superiority yet humbleness, one of strength that also had a tinge of weakness from wanting to ensure that everyone under his care made it home safe, which would lead to his own personal safety being at risk. She saw it for herself when he had rode into Babylon with his knights on horseback, the white knight himself wielding a shield, lance, and sword that he used to bash and slash away at his opponents until none remained.

It also the biggest reason why she ended up losing against her emotions and falling for him. And here, on the day before they would head out to their destiny, she was going to make sure he knew it.

"I wanted to thank you again for coming to Babylon, Lucius. We really needed some help, and to be honest I was starting to believe that no one was going to come for us." said Azura to break the ice that had been created between them.

"There's no need to. I was doing my duty as a knight to protect my allies against harm. I couldn't let my fellow man be killed, I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I did."

"No, really." stated Azura seriously when she grabbed onto his hand and looked directly into his eyes

When he raised an eyebrow in confusion Azura squealed a tiny bit and blushed heavily, her embarrassment making her think thoughts that made her even more embarrassed. However to her surprise Lucius started to laugh and he placed a hand on her shoulder gently, winking and giving her a grin that made her blush turn an even darker shade of red.

"Okay Azura, I get it. You're very welcome, I'm glad that I could be of service." he said, Azura letting go of his hand and biting her lower lip.

"You blockhead…" she muttered under her breath.

Before Lucius could ask what she meant he was suddenly jerked down when she grasped the cuff of his armor and kissed him on the lips, his eyes shooting wide open in shock. She pulled her lips away from his after a few seconds and giggled at the dumbfounded look her gave her, the shock from the show of affection still affecting him.

He opened his mouth to say something, closed it, and then saw that sparkle in her eyes that told him exactly how she felt. "Well...okay then. Are you sure?"

"Oh you better believe it Mr. White Knight."

She then grabbed onto his hand and took off with him towards the inner city where she had found a place to stay after coming to Avalonnis. As quickly as she had shut the door behind them she was all over the knight, helping him strip off his armor and throwing it to the side in a mad frenzy to reach the well-sculpted and fit body she knew was underneath.

A minute later they had locked themselves away in her bedroom and Azura fell down onto her bed, her right arm covering up her large breasts and her left hand hiding her crotch. She beckoned Lucius over and when he got close she uncovered her breasts and wrapped her arms around his neck, bringing him into a kiss as she spread her legs apart in order to invite him in.

Meanwhile outside nearby the house they were in, Taiyang stood atop the roof of a building with his eyes glued on it and chuckled to himself.

" _Yes my young human children, enjoy this time of relaxation for now. You're going to need it for the coming battle ahead._ " he thought before leaping away to check up on Wintorra and Kanon.

 **\- The Next Morning -**

Lucius led Azura, Wintorra, and Kanon out from the gates of Avalonnis, with each of them riding on the back of a Danger Beast horse that would take them to their final destination. Azura was on Lucius' side and she smiled at him when they stopped, the knight winking at her before he glanced back at Wintorra and Kanon, who nod their heads once in confirmation. They were all ready.

"Our target is Mephistopheles, the enemy Commander!" he announced as he pointed his new weapon, a lance sword that glowed with electrical energy as he sent bolts of his lightning coursing through it. "Let us be off! We, the Four Horsemen, shall bring an end to this war once and for all!"


	62. Duel of the Fates

A/N Hello guys, me again. First things first I'd like to say that these weekly uploads, at least, are going to be the new update schedule. With College almost here and Baseball season as well, there is no chance that I'll be able to get you guys chapters on a 4 day basis. Also, I decided to wait on creating the character pages for **Lucius** , **Wintorra** , **Azura** , and **Kanon** because I wanted to wait until this chapter came out. Let's just say some major plot twist bombs are incoming people.

And another reason why it took me so long to get this chapter out alongside me deciding to extend the time between uploads is that I was thinking and writing heavily on a future chapter that's coming up soon, and I needed to get it out of my system now so that I can focus on the present. I did the same thing with Kurome's death back in Part 1, I had that written out way in advance before that chapter actually came out, so yeah. That's a thing. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 61 - Duel of the Fates**

The newly christened Four Horsemen rode silently across the ever-stretching landscape toward their ultimate goal, the fortress of their enemy known only as the Bastion. They had no idea what kind of opposition they were going to face before even meeting their target, and this coupled with the fact they had no backup whatsoever made them all extremely tense. There were so many unknown variables that could end up turning their mission sour, but remarkably they all remained steadfast thanks to the optimism of their unofficial yet officially elected leader Lucius.

Even though he had not asked to be made the leader of the Four Horsemen, the other three members readily agreed to the idea since he had the clear marking of a natural-born leader. And so now, hundreds of miles away from their homes and nearing the border of the Far South, past the ruins of the Kingdom of Babylon, he was dutifully at work thinking of strategies and counterstrategies in his mind.

He was so focused on doing this that it became relevant to the others, especially to Azura and Wintorra, the latter being his second-in-command, that he needed to rest.

"Lucius." spoke up Wintorra, the knight jumping a little when she grabbed his shoulder and shook him a little.

"Huh? What is it?" he asked.

"Let's rest for a few, I can tell you starting to overwork yourself."

Lucius waved his hand and chuckled at her statement, his eyes rising to meet the sun's glare high in the sky. "I'm fine, really. I want to get there as soon as possible sp-"

"Lucius."

He turned around when Azura cut him off and maneuvered her horse over to his, the entire group stopping in response once she had his attention. The knight could see the concern in her eyes and he couldn't help but feel guilty of something even though he himself felt like he hadn't done anything wrong.

"We all want to bring an end to this war as quickly as possible, but if we keep going with little to no rest we're going to tire ourselves out before we even get there. You especially need it more then us, Wintorra and I can both tell that your trying to think up every single kind of plan for every single kind of situation, and you're becoming mentally exhausted from it." said Azura in a stern, yet soft tone meant she wasn't mad by any means. "So come on, let's just sit down for a while and relax. We need to take advantage of times like these because once we get to the Bastion, we'll have to be at the top of our game. Okay?"

Lucius nod his head once and one by one they got off of their horses and found a nearby rock outcropping, since they were in the desert, which they surprisingly found out wasn't that hot, to tie off their steeds and set up a temporary camp. Azura gathered some rocks to put into a circle for a fire pit and once that was done, she snapped her fingers and created a small ball of fire that she set down inside of it.

Kanon carried over a couple of large boulders for them to sit on with no effort whatsoever and then took off his armored conical hat to begin his transition into relaxation mode. Lucius and Azura took a seat together on one of the rocks, the former removing his helmet and letting out a sigh of relief now that he could breath more efficiently without the piece of armor covering his head.

"Well, now that we're sitting down, we should at least entertain ourselves by engaging in some talking." said Wintorra as she leaned forward and rested her hands on her knees, her gaze settled on them all. "What do you think Lucius?"

"I agree. In fact, I was thinking about this earlier, so I'm glad you brought it up. I've always believed that to know those you are about to fight with on a personal level strengthens the bonds of trust and friendship between them, so that on the battlefield they'll each watch each other's backs." he replied with a smile.

"So you want us to talk about ourselves?" asked Wintorra to confirm his meaning.

"That is correct."

Wintorra took her hands off of her knees and crossed her legs over, leaning back on her elbows while yawning slightly when she felt the soft hands of sleep slowly start to reach for her. "Well alright then, you go first Mr. White Knight."

Lucius chuckled at his unofficial nickname, which he had been so graciously given by Azura and adopted by the group when she had blurted it out to them when they were leaving Avalonnis. He sat up with his back straight and placed his hands in his lap before addressing the group with a light-hearted tone.

"Well, okay then. As you all know, I'm Lucius, Captain of the Knights of Avalonnis. I was born there in Avalonnis, and ever since I was little I dreamed of being one of the protectors of the city, so I trained practically every day to try and do just that. As you can see it worked out in the end." said Lucius to start of the round of sharing, his simple explanation of his life causing Azura to giggle a little while Kanon merely huffed a little.

This, of course, caught the attention of Lucius and seemed to stir something up inside of him. He pointed a finger at him and with a challenging grin he asked, "Oh? Got something to say? How about you go next then."

Kanon raised an eyebrow and shrugged before clearing his throat in order to speak. Wintorra and Lucius havn't heard him say a word yet, so they were both interested to hear just exactly how his voice sounded.

"I'm Kanon, and I've known Azura ever since we were kids." he said, short and quick, the meager explanation quickly souring the moods of Lucius and Wintorra since they were wanting to hear more.

"That's it? Oh come on, there has to be more!" pressured Wintorra, the armored giant making a quick glance at Azura and waiting for her to nod her head.

She did and he sighed, the giant running a hand through his hair and looking up towards the darkening skies above while reminiscing of the past.

"Well, you see...Azura and I never really got to know our parents. Babylon was attacked during our youth by hostile Danger Beasts, mindless creatures that were nowhere near the ones living in the city, and our parents were guardians of the city. They left to defend the city, and they ended up dying. In the span of a few hours we were both orphaned, and thankfully we were able to rely on one another since our families were close friends." started Kanon, the smiles Lucius and Wintorra had quickly fading when the story took a dark turn into the pasts of Azura and Kanon.

Lucius turned to look at Azura herself to see from her if what he was saying was true, and when she wrapped her hand around his and squeezed it as if he were her support, he knew it must certainly be true.

"We grew up together, surviving on the streets of Babylon off the spare food we got whenever we could, until we were eventually taken in by an elderly woman who, out of the goodness of her heart, took care of us as if we were her own children. As we grew older we later found that she had lost her children to disease, and that having us with her brought back some happy memories of hers. And for us, we were happy as well since we finally had someone who would care for us."

He went on to tell them about, after they had reach an old enough age, he and Azura left the old woman and thanked her for everything she had done for them and entered Babylon's streets as new people completely different from when they were young. They ended up joining the kingdom's military, and through devotion never before seen by anyone they earned themselves top positions

When he was finished all eyes fell on Wintorra and she chuckled, her laugh contrasting the miserable demeanor she was broadcasting with the expression and body posture she had. "I guess it's my turn, huh? Well...you better prepare yourselves, because my childhood was pretty shitty too…"

"How bad was it?" asked Lucius.

"Let's just say it's something that I'm not quite comfortable talking about to this day…" started Wintorra before she exhaled steadily and curbed her emotions. "Unlike you guys, Kanon, Azura, my family didn't die...they abandoned me, threw me out like some garbage."

Her description immediately drew the attention of the other Horsemen, their rock-hard stares locking onto the ice-user.

"You see, up in the north, the entire population comprises of various clans that with the help of Abraxas and the ice dragons came together to found Glacies. My clan was one of the more prominent ones, and we had a reputation for turning out the strongest warriors. The reason for this was because of a law put in place by the Clan Chief, that every newborn child, whether they be male or female, once they reached age 5 they were sent out onto the frozen tundra to survive for an entire week with no help whatsoever. So, as you can expect, I was sent out when I reached age 5, and my only goal was to return to the clan once I had survived for a week."

"What would happen then?" asked Azura timidly, the very thought of a mere child trying to live out there in the far north mind-boggling.

"Upon returning, the child would then be accepted as a member of the clan. If the child died...they were forgotten, like they had never even existed in the first place. I myself was on the verge of death until Abraxas found me and took me under her wing, raising me as if I were her own child. She taught me how to survive on my own, and when I was old enough I made the journey back to my clan to see if I would still be accepted."

Wintorra paused for a moment to gather herself when her lower lip quivered, the bad memories that came back the more she talked about them making it even harder for her to speak. Before she even said it though, Lucius, Azura and Kanon already knew what happened when she returned to her family and clan, and that alone was tearing them up inside.

"B-But, instead of accepting me, they turned me away. I had already been forgotten, and to make it worse, my parents already had another child whom they had raised in my place when I never came back." said Wintorra through the tears that had started to roll down her cheeks, her iron will unable to stop her emotions.

Without a word Kanon stood up from his rock seat and walked over to Wintorra, the man wrapping a single arm around her shoulders and hugging her. She allowed herself lean into Kanon's embrace and sobbed quietly into the crook of his arm, the giant gently rubbing her head like a mother would to its distressed child so that she would feel safe. After a couple minutes of crying she moved out of Kanon's arm and thanked him, the man nodding his head once in reply before crossing his arms over his chest and closed his eyes.

"That's...that's just awful…" murmured Azura in a low tone out of pity and disgust, but instead of agreeing with her Wintorra put up a smile and waved away the claim.

"It's all in the past now. Abraxas and the ice dragons became my new family, and now I have you guys too. You're my family now, and I couldn't be happier." she said, her quick attitude change spreading to the others like a disease and lightening the mood around the campfire.

"And we couldn't be happier to have you with us, Wintorra." replied Lucius with a grin.

"Yeah! We're all one family!" added on Azura happily.

"And speaking of family…" said Kanon with a tiny grin before motioning to Lucius and Azura. "The both of you, how long have you been in a relationship?"

The sudden question caught both of them off guard, and like an instinctual reaction Azura let go of Lucius' hand and scooted over a few inches while blushing heavily.

"U-Um what are you t-talking about Kanon?" she asked with a stutter, Wintorra's interest shooting through the roof.

"Good catch Kanon, I've been wondering that myself. I could tell something was up between you two ever since we left Avalonnis, considering how close you were to him Azura." said Wintorra with a mischievous smile, her pressuring of the two bringing a laugh out of Kanon.

When neither of them spoke up out of embarrassment Wintorra glanced over at Kanon and they both nod their heads, agreeing on something they silently spoke with between them through their gazes. They looked back and Wintorra's grin became even wider as she leaned forward and stared directly at Azura, being sure that she had her attention.

"So, Azura, let me ask you _one_ question…"

The silver-haired Babylonian raised an eyebrow in anticipation and worry for what was coming next. When enough dramatic suspense had built between them Wintorra pointed at Lucius and without any concern for common courtesy or etiquette she asked, "Have you two had sex yet?"

If Lucius and Azura weren't embarrassed then, they sure were now when they both developed blushes redder then the reddest tomatoes in response to her outrageous question. The obvious answer was yes, they have, but they wouldn't tell her that. It wasn't right.

Kanon couldn't maintain his emotionless facade any longer and broke out into a fit of laughter at how uncomfortable his friends were, the two of them totally at the mercy of Wintorra.

"Do we really have to answer that question?" asked Lucius.

"No, of course not. I just wanted to mess around with you guys." said Wintorra before she leaned forward and winked. "And besides, just from your reaction alone I can tell you two already have."

The rest of the day escaped from the four as they shared bouts of laughter and stories from their lives and before they knew it, the sun had already set and it was decided they all get some much needed sleep. They were going to need it for the coming battle with their toughest adversary, the so-called "God of Chaos".

 **\- The Next Day -**

"There it is. It's the Bastion."

Azura, Wintorra and Kanin crested the sand dune behind Lucius and gazed out over the flat depression beneath them, the fortress belonging to their enemy resting right in the center.

It was an enormous feat of stone architecture, featuring incredibly high walls riddled with battlements and slots for archers to fire their arrows through. What put them off though wasn't the size and grandeur of the fortress, but the fact that there were no guards whatsoever. Even the front gate was wide open, as if their enemy was inviting them in without any resistance.

It was a mistake they would be sure to take advantage of in order to survey the area and discover any choke points they could use. They hid their horses behind the sand dune and made their way on foot to the fortress, their senses on high alert. They were walking into uncharted territory, the home of their greatest enemy, and they had no idea what could be hiding behind every corner and inside every shadow.

"Everyone, have your weapons at the ready in case there are some guards." ordered Lucius quietly as he hefted up his shield and tightened his grip around his lance sword.

Wintorra brought around her maroon greatsword, Azura her katana, and Kanon merely clenched his fists and popped all ten of his knuckles simultaneously. Lucius ordered them to split up into two groups to spread out their search of the Bastion's exterior, and with a nod Kanon split off with Azura to cover the left side of the fortress while Lucius and Wintorra got the right.

They were to meet at the entrance to the inner castle structure after completed their survey, Lucius had said, before they departed from one another, the two groups heading off on their own afterwards.

"Seeing this place totally devoid of anything except one person puts me on edge...I feel like he already knows we're here." said Wintorra after clearing a corner with Lucius, the two proceeding down the walkway toward what they believed to be barracks.

"He probably does. If he's as strong as Noctis had said, then he'll be waiting for us."

"Was that supposed to make me feel better? Because it failed miserably." berated Wintorra with a frown.

"No, it wasn't. It's to prepare you." replied Lucius with a glare at her, his tone of voice so ominous it actually sent chills running up and down her spine. "There's no chance of us having the element of surprise. We'll have to go full strength right from the get go, because he's probably already gauging our abilities now."

They did the rest of their search in silence with the heavy weight of the knight's words hanging over them, and when they were finished they made their way towards the central castle complex to meet up with the others. It took them a few minutes, but they finally made it to the entrance gate where Kanon and Azura were waiting for them.

With a nod from Lucius, Azura placed both of her hands and the metal gate and used her power to superheat the bars and start to melt them. Wintorra grinned when one by one the metal bars turned to a bright yellowish-orange goop that dripped through her fingertips and gathered in a puddle at her feet.

"This is pretty handy." she remarked with after the last bar liquefied in her hands, her efforts having produced a hole wide enough for them to walk through with ease.

Lucius went in first and then stepped aside to allow Azura, Wintorra, and Kanon in by him. When the lumbering armored giant meandered his way under the bars they walked slowly down the cold hallway toward whatever lie at its end. As they walked their footsteps echoed off the walls, bouncing up and down in all directions for an unknown amount of times before the sounds returned to their ears.

"Hey guys, before we get ourselves into the mess that I know will be coming up soon...I just want to say it's been fun being with you all." said Wintorra with a smile, Lucius glancing at her and chuckling.

"It has been a pleasure. How about after this is all said and done, we go back to Avalonnis and all have a drink on me. There's this one tavern I frequent that has the best liquor in all of the kingdom."

"A drink sounds really great right about now." said Azura while she tantalizingly imagined sipping on a large liter of beer, or sake, or some form of alcohol.

"I can get behind that." added on Kanon before he looked to Lucius and nudged him in the arm with his elbow. "And you, Lucius, I expect you to take good care of Azura from here on."

They all shared a final laugh before they were all met with an overwhelming aura that none of them aside from Lucius had felt before. The knight immediately recognized it as the same aura he had felt on the last day he had seen Noctis alive. It was none other then Mephistopheles himself, and as they got closer to the end of the hallway they found out that the room at the end was a throne room, the centermost room in the entire fortress.

It would be the battleground for their final confrontation.

"Get ready guys, it's him." said Lucius in a low tone as they neared the throne room, the other horsemen tensing up.

They stepped out into the throne room and stood rigidly still at the foot of an immensely long red carpet leading up an occupied throne, the figure sitting in it dressed entirely in dark maroon armor that covered all parts of his body. The only evidence that told them it was living was the pair of yellow and orange reptilian eyes staring at them evilly.

"So...you're the ones they sent to kill me." said Mephistopheles as he stood up out of the throne and crossed his arms. "Pathetic. Four humans won't be enough to kill me."

"We're not your average humans, Mephistopheles." growled Lucius when with a mere spark he covered his lance sword in a coat of lightening, the crackling bolts swarming around him like an angry and feral beast.

Following after him Azura formed a swirling storm of flames around herself and her blade, then came Wintorra with her ice that levitated as several large chunks behind her back. Kanon, since he did not have a distinct element that he could wield or manifest, merely cracked his knuckles and sighed.

"Mephistopheles, we, the Four Horsemen, have come here to bring an end to this war once and for all by killing you. Prepare yourself!"

The Danger Beast reached back to a large cleaver sword leaning up against one arm of his throne and twirled it around in his hand like it was made out of paper, his gaze locked on his four new opponents. A ghastly laugh escaped from his helmet before the Four Horsemen rushed their opponent with their weapons held high and determined expressions on their faces.

Lucius was the first to reach Mephistopheles and he had to raise his shield in order to block his opponent's downward strike, a grunt escaping his lips from the force the Danger Beast had put behind his blow. Kanon appeared on his left to throw a punch at his exposed right cheek, and he was surprised when Mephistopheles merely turned his head toward him and allowed his knuckles to ram into his helmet's face.

The blow hardly even made a dent in the armor and he felt nothing from the punch, which meant he could easily counter the two of them by pushing back Lucius and round-house kicking Kanon to the side. When they disappeared Azura and Wintorra took their place and began to attack him with their blades, driving him back one step at a time until he was drawn into a corner with no escape options.

Wintorra flung her arm up and manifested several ice horns at their target's feet, Mephistopheles unable to react and time and grunted when his arms and thighs were actually pierced by the ice. With him now pinned, Azura prepared to stab him through the heart with her blade coated in fire

"Do not think I can so easily be cornered!" roared Mephistopheles when he broke free of the ice and swung his cleaver sword, blowing away both Azura and Wintorra with ease.

Lucius and Kanon caught them both and growled as Mephistopheles cracked his neck and chuckled when the wounds in his body instantly healed, followed by his very _armor_ fixing itself to the point he regained his previous appearance before he received his injuries.

"Fighting him like this won't bring us victory any sooner, we need to come up a plan that goes around his healing factor." whispered Lucius to his comrades as they took advantage of this momentary lapse in fighting to recover.

"What do you have in mind?" asked Wintorra.

"So far you're the only one that's been able to make it past his armor and injure him, so you'll be our Trump Card. We can't have you getting hurt, so you'll remain as a passive fighter, attacking only from a distance."

"What about us?" questioned Azura with a quick glance at the knight.

"Us three will keep Mephistopheles occupied and beat him down, and when the moment presents itself to get in the killing blow, Wintorra will be the one to do it." explained lucius before he looked directly at Wintorra and narrowed his eyes. "And I don't care what you do to do it. I want everyone here to realize that we must bring an end to this war through any means necessary...If I or any of us have to sacrifice ourselves to give Wintorra a clear shot, take it."

With a solemn expression they each nod their heads once, agreeing to the terms he had laid out. Their plan of attack now set, the Four Horsemen put it into action with Wintorra stepping back and using her long range techniques to put Mephistopheles on the defensive for her allies. With their backup, Lucius, Kanon and Azura went toe-to-toe with the Danger Beast, their blades and fists clashing with one another and creating a racket all on its own.

Mephistopheles fought back against them and returned the blows they gave with twice the strength, his sword easily cutting through Lucius' and Kanon's armor and reaching skin. Azura jumped in whenever she could and could easily overwhelm him with her flames, but just like before he healed himself and continued to fight like he had lost no strength whatsoever. Lucius grunted when he was punched in the gut and coughed up blood, the fist breaking through his armor and reaching his ribcage.

"Lucius!'" exclaimed Azura when Mephistopheles pressed his attack, slamming another fist into the knight's helmet and shattering it into dozens of pieces.

"You were fools to think you could kill me! Now accept your fate and bow down to me!" yelled Mephistopheles when he slashed through one of the knight's knees and dropped him down to one knee.

"I'd rather die then become a slave…" said Lucius tiredly, the other Horsemen watching in silence.

"Very well." replied Mephistopheles.

In a flash he grasped his cleaver sword with two hands and took a single step forward, the tip of the blade piercing through his chest and exploding out from his back. He gasped when the Danger Beast twisted the blade a little bit to inflict even more internal damage before he slowly pulled the blade and kicked Lucius down onto his back.

"You bastard! Die in a fire!" snarled Azura as she created a massive inferno around her and sent it after Mephistopheles, the fire consuming him in a matter of seconds.

While he stumbled back to try and put out the fire, Kanon and Azura ran to their friend's side to help him up and see just how bad his injury was. He coughed up blood when they lifted them to his feet, and even more gushed out of his wound when he tried to breath.

"Guys, I'm fine...really." he said as he let go of them and supported himself on his lance sword.

"You are most certainly not fine. We need to retreat and get you medical assistance. Once you're healed we can try again, which should be better considering we've seen him fight now." said Azura sternly.

"By then it will be too late." replied Lucius while in the background Wintorra kept their enemy occupied with her ice.

"Even with us fighting him at full strength, his healing factor keeps him from getting seriously injured. We need a way to keep him still long enough for Wintorra to pierce his heart, since it's the only thing that I can assume is keeping him alive." said Lucius when he dropped his shield and, albeit painfully, began to remove his armor and drop it in a pile at his feet. "Which is why I'll be the one to allow her to do so. This body of mine shall be the catalyst which will bring about this war's end."

"No! I won't let you sacrifice yourself!" cried Azura when Lucius removed his chest piece and flexed his blood and bruised covered muscles, the pain now second to his will.

"Azura, you know exactly why I'm doing this. I will not allow any more innocent people and Danger Beasts to die in this awful war." He turned to face her and gave her a weak smile. "If I must die to save the lives of many…,then I will gladly make that sacrifice. Azura, I love you, and I want you to carry on my legacy with you. You know what I'm talking about, right?"

Azura's gaze lowered and she gingerly placed a hand on her stomach, a single tear emerging from the corner of her eye and falling down her cheek. She slowly nod her head and Lucius chuckled, his gaze returning to the now extinguished Mephistopheles.

At a time like this, where he knew this was going to be his final act on this world, there was only one thing he could think of. The oath he took upon being made a Knight of Avalonnis, one of the Kingdom's strongest warriors.

" _In brightest day and brightest night, all of thine enemies will dread my might. Through my will and strength, my light shall be the beacon with which the people can trust and hope in. I am a Guardian of Avalonnis, a White Knight who shall be the protector of the people. It is through training that I gain strength, it is through my brothers that I gain friendship, it is through the people that I gain hope, it is through battle that I gain glory, and it is through passing that I gain immortality. This is my creed, and I shall live and die by it._ " he repeated within his thoughts, the words slowly giving him strength he never knew he had.

Slowly he raised his lance spear up and created bolts of lightning that swirled and crackled around him, growing stronger and stronger until both Mephistopheles and Wintorra took notice. Just from the look on his face she knew that the time for her to act was at hand, so she stopped firing icicles and waited for Lucius to make his move.

"Oh, so you're still alive? I'm surprised, I should have ruptured one of your lungs." stated Mephistopheles as he stabbed the tip of his sword into the ground and leaned on it.

"It will take more then some measly injury such as this to keep me down. Now, it's time to bring an end to this." replied Lucius as he pointed his lance sword toward the sky.

At first nothing happened, but then with a resounding boom the ceiling exploded when a lightning bolt came crashing down from a thunderstorm that had suddenly formed above the Bastion. It struck Lucius full force and boosted his power an infinite number of times, his hair standing on end as a result of the electricity streaming through his body.

"This ends now!"

In a literal flash of lightning Lucius engaged Mephistopheles in a brutal sword fight, the knight taking one more slash after the other that only served to cover his body in more blood. Regardless of the pain he continued to fight Mephistopheles, his lightning enhanced state beginning to wear down the Danger Beast's defenses and open him up for more worthwhile strikes. Lucius rammed his fist into his stomach and cracked his armor, catching Mephistopheles off guard for just long enough to get in another blow to his face.

When he was off balance, Lucius took the opportunity and dropped his weapon, threw his arms underneath the Danger Beast's armpits and locked him in place, keeping him still long enough to give Wintorra what she had been waiting for.

"Wintorra! Do it! Aim for his heart!" bellowed Lucius at the top of his lungs, Mephistopheles snarling and growling like some wild animal to try and break free.

"Unhand me, vermin!"

Wintorra let out a heavy sigh before she created a bow made entirely out of ice and drew one ice arrow, the razor sharp tip glistening from the light of the lightning surrounding Lucius. She closed one eye and focused on Mephistopheles, the arrow lining up with the spot directly above his heart, and let out one slow breath.

" _Lucius...I'm sorry._ "

"Eis-Stern." she said, her fingers letting loose the arrow.

It flew like a bullet through the air, striking Mephistopheles dead on in the chest and piercing straight through his armor right to his heart, the blow causing him to grunt in discomfort. Suddenly dozens of ice shards exploded out from his back, which as a result ended up harming Lucius as well and causing severe damage that, coupled with his previous injury, put the final nail in his coffin.

He let go of Mephistopheles and collapsed to a knee, Azura and Kanon hurrying to his side while Wintorra dispersed her bow and let out a sigh of relief. Mephistopheles meanwhile coughed and hacked up his blood, the devastating blow to his heart rendering him unable to heal himself, so the only thing he could do was stumble over towards his throne and fall into it.

"If you think you've had the last laugh...you're _dead_ wrong…" snarled Mephistopheles before he raised a hand and snapped his fingers.

From the ceiling dropped down several pitch black snakes that quickly wrapped themselves around the shoulders of each Horsemen and, with a hiss, bit down on any exposed skin they could see and injected their venom. Azura incinerated the snake that bit her and then did the same to the one around Lucius' neck, who was then followed by Kanon crushed his snake and Wintorra sliced hers in half with an ice dagger.

"What the hell did you just do to us?" demanded Azura with a growl, the hoarse laughter emanating from behind the helmet of Mephistopheles brooding with ill will.

"I created those snakes myself and gave them my very own venom, a venom that is very special indeed. Once it's injected into your bloodstream, it automatically fuses with your blood and can no longer be removed." said Mephistopheles with a wheeze, his last ounce of strength devoting itself to his final sentence. "The kicker...is that once you all die, the venom will instigate a transformation in which you will all turn into Danger Beasts doomed to live for all of eternity. No matter how many near-life death experiences you may face, my venom will keep you alive."

Wintorra, Kanon, Azura and Lucius were left utterly speechless at the horrifying reality they were now faced with. Once they died, they would become heartless and mindless Danger Beasts themselves, and they wouldn't even be able to die. They were being forced to walk the earth as creatures for the rest of their lives...a fate even worse then death itself.

"H-Have fun…" murmured Mephistopheles with a laugh before he finally gave in to his injury and died sitting in his throne.

That's when Azura finally realized something even more terrible then the fact they would not be able to die as human beings. Lucius was currently dying in her arms just then, and from his injuries she, Kanon, and Wintorra knew that he didn't have long until he would become the first to transform.

Wintorra and Kanon, realizing that she'll be needing some time to herself in order to accept this reality, quickly walked over to their enemy's corpse and gazed upon it with a look of disgust. Knowing that the ice arrow would eventually melt over time and allow Mephistopheles to regenerate and come back to life, she created an ice dagger in her hand and started to cut through his armor to his bloody chest. With the skill of a sloppy surgeon she cut out Mephistopheles' heart and held the organ in her grasp for but a moment before she froze it in a block of ice and handed it to Kanon, who took it and grasped it firmly like it was a precious treasure.

"Let's leave them alone." whispered Wintorra to the giant before they crept out of the throne room to wait just outside in the hallway for Azura to finish up her business.

A minute after they had left she was still grasping Lucius tightly, her heart refusing to believe that he was going to die when earlier they had all made a promise to visit his favorite tavern back in Avalonnis. He could see the tears in her eyes and he smiled weakly while he cupped her cheek with a hand, drawing her attention to his face.

"Azura...I know what y-you're probably thinking right now...I'll be fine, trust me."

"I-I won't leave you...I don't want you to be alone…"

"Azura, there's no hope for me now...It's taking every bit of the strength I still have left to hold on to this world. When I do transform...it won't be good...I won't recognize you, I'll just be some other mindless Danger Beast that wants to kill you…"

"No...no you can't...you can't do that!" cried Azura, her hands grip on his tightening even more.

"I don't want to either...trust me, I don't either...I want to go back with you guys, to have a drink...just like we promised."

"It's horrible...first I lose my parents, then my friends, and now you…? Please…*I don't want you to go."

Lucius sighed when he lost all feeling in his legs and lower body, the venom inside of his blood beginning its cruel work one step at a time. He was running out of time, and he needed to get Azura to leave with the others before he turned into whatever Danger Beast the venom had planned for him.

"Azura, you have to leave me. I don't want you to be around when I turn...I want you to remember me as I am now...not as what I'll become." You have to do this for me...for...for our child…I don't want to end up hurting you."

"O-Okay...okay…" stuttered Azura through her tears, her heart beginning to crack and break apart piece by piece the longer she spent with the one she loved.

"Just promise me this...live your life to the fullest, keep me in your mind always, and when you reach the end of that road, and eventually become a Danger Beast...come look for me. I'll wait for you here, and when we meet again, we can both tear this world apart...together." said Lucius when he began to cry, the own sorrow in his heart overtaking the pain he felt from his body.

Azura giggled a little and she nod her head a few times while wiping away the tears, her fingers letting go of his hand and falling to her side. Lucius laughed one last time before he whispered for her to go, his loved one complying to his dying wish by standing up and slowly making her way away from him towards the other Horsemen waiting just outside the throne room.

They made their way out of the Bastion in silence, and it was only when they returned to their horses did Wintorra turn back to look at the fortress and close her eyes. Not wanting anyone to ever find this place or the body of Mephistopheles ever again, she mustered up all of her power and raised her arm up toward the brightly shining sun, which had been revealed when the thunderstorm Lucius had manifested earlier dissipated.

"Ice Storm Commander-in-Chief: Apocalypse Zero." she said, a giant crystal of ice that had formed in the air above her index finger rocketing up miles high into the sky before exploding as a huge cloud of ice, snow and frigid air that blanketed the entire desert bordering the Southern Lands, the instant winter hiding the ruins of Babylon under several hundred feet of snow and turning the desert into a frozen tundra plagued by an ever-raging snowstorm.

"Let's go." said Azura blankly, the Four Horsemen now reduced to only three members climbing atop their steeds and riding off in painful silence.

Meanwhile, inside the Bastion's throne room, Lucius was experiencing his final moments of life and felt his body grow colder and colder the closer he came to death. When he saw the first snowflakes of the russian winter Wintorra had created fly down through the hole his lightning had created earlier, he felt a gentle, almost nonexistent warmth from the ice crystals the moment they touched his skin rather then something cold.

" _Azura...even if it means I have to wait an eternity, I will see you again…_ " was his last thought before he passed away, the venom inside his body surging towards his heart to jumpstart it and begin his transformation.

With a loud roar he jolted to life as his body was consumed by red and orange feathers, the bones growing four times their normal size in the first half-second of the transformation from Human to Danger Beast. Larger and larger he grew, the knight leaping up through the hole in the ceiling and screaming one last time before he fully transformed into a majestic bird-like Danger Beast with lightning lacing its feathers, a thunderbird straight out of the myths. He turned his head to the left and clearly saw through the snowstorm, which had yet to fully develop into something fierce, his former comrades. However, instead of giving chase like his instincts told him to do, he instead landed atop the largest tower of the Bastion and clawed the stone roof with his talons before he curled up around the spire and sat perfectly still to begin his wait.

" _I will see you again...my love…_ "

* * *

A/N

Here is a translation for the technique Wintorra used

Eis-Stern - Ice Star

...

"The Seven Deadly Sins, a group of extraordinary individuals who can wield devices never before seen. Each member embodies, either physically or mentally, the vice they represent. Pride, Greed, Sloth, Envy, Lust, Gluttony...and Wrath. They are my strongest warriors...so it would be wise not to earn my ire, for it would be the last thing you ever do on this earth.


	63. Splitting Up

A/N Hello guys. First thing I'd like to say is that the character pages for **Lucius** and **Azura** have been put up on the wiki **FanficCollective** , so go and check them out. The other two, **Kanon** and **Wintorra** , will follow shortly. I had to do scholarship research, what fun.

Anyways, if you guys didn't catch the hint I dropped at the end of the last chapter, then you'll definitely know what became of the Four Horsemen at the beginning of this chapter _and_ more. Taiyang's story is coming to an end, which means we'll finally get back to the present and the matter at hand. We're also one step closer to the future chapter I finished writing too...it's gonna be great, let me tell you. Sorry for the short chapter too. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 62 - Splitting Up**

"So...what happened then?" asked Leonard when Taiyang left off on a low note, the fate of the Four Horsemen's leader somehow striking them as familiar.

Taiyang let out a heavy sigh and stared at them all, his domineering gaze telling them right off the bat that this was one of the most crucial parts of his tale, one piece of evidence that would change their entire view.

"As you would expect, the other three Horsemen lived their lives to the fullest until they each were met with their unfortunate fates. Kabon, while remaining in touch with Azura and Wintorra, became a hermit that lived at Mt. Fake alone until his death. Azura returned to Avalonnis and shared the grief of her lover's death with the other knights, the group taking her in and treating her as family. She would later give birth to a boy who grew up inspired by the stories of his father to become a champion of the people. His line would grow and flourish until one day, a descendant was able to become the ruler of his own kingdom, one that was built atop the ruins of Avalonnis."

"What is as his name?" asked Maya.

"This man was none other then Arthur Pendragon, the King of Avalon, and eventually First Emperor of the Empire until his untimely accident and rebirth into the being known as "Excalibur"."

Everyone in attendance gasped at the shocking revelation of how far Arthur's family line went back. Being the First Emperor that founded the Empire was already surprising enough, but to learn that he was descended from one of the Four Horsemen, the *leader no less, was astounding.

Tatsumi, ever observant, then asked, "Wait, if Arthur is descended from Lucius, then why couldn't he wield lightning like he could when he was alive?"

Taiyang had an answer for him readily available. "That is because, over time with each generation, the concentration of my blood in each descendant's blood stream dropped until there was nothing but a tiny sliver of it left. Arthur could have regained his lightning manipulation abilities if he were to ingest my blood again, but there is no chance of that happening now that he has become a machine without any blood."

Tatsumi nod his head, satisfied with the answer, and waited silently for Taiyang to continue explaining the fate of the other Horsemen, Wintorra, whom he had already begun to suspect was somehow related in some way, shape and form with Alzora and Demon's Extract. Taiyang, expecting another question, cleared his throat when no one else spoke up and continued where he left off.

"Eventually, just like Kanon, Azura left her family and died alone in order not to endanger anyone when she transformed into her Danger Beast form. Moving on to Wintorra, she returned to Glacies and retained close ties with Abraxas and the rest of the ice dragons, paying visits to their home frequently when she had free time. Eventually she too settled down and married, producing a child that, like her, could freely create and manipulate ice. And just like the descendants of Lucius, they too would lose their affinity for ice until all that remained was a sliver of Abraxas' blood left, meaning all they had to do was drink the blood of those who were related to her and they would regain their lost ability." said Taiyang as he nonchalantly turned his gaze specifically to Esdeath and Lucena, the others slowly turning to look at them and put the puzzle pieces the Danger Beast had just laid down for them.

"No way…" murmured Lubbock while Akame merely smiled, the two ice users glancing at one another.

"Now _that_ is fucking cool." added on Leone.

Taiyang coughed to get their attention again, his gaze still resting on Esdeath and Lucena. "Esdeath, as a result of consuming the blood of Alzora, daughter of Abraxas, you regained the ice manipulation abilities that your ancestor, Wintorra, possessed in her lifetime."

"Wait, let me get this straight." said Esdeath, who was still trying to wrap her head around the truth Taiyang had presented them. "I didn't gain my ice manipulation abilities from drinking Demon's Extract, I *reawakened them by drinking it since I had never really lost them in the first place, since I'm related to Wintorra?"

"That is correct. How do you think Young Lucena was able to gain her abilities? Because she is your daughter, she was born with them naturally." replied Taiyang with a smile.

"But I don't understand. When I ingested Alzora's blood there were these horrific voices that entered my minds, talking about killing and slaughter. Why?"

"That would be my fault...sorry." said Alzora with a cheesy smile. "Before I was killed, all of those thoughts towards my killers were going through my head, so I guess they got transferred through my blood into the creation of Demon's Extract."

Alzora walked over to Esdeath and gave her a hug to apologize again for what happened, and she returned it with a warm smile added on before they all looked back at Taiyang, who still had to answer one more question they were all waiting to learn about.

"So if they all ended up becoming Danger Beasts...where did they all go?" asked Maya, the most curious of the group.

This was when Taiyang lost his humorous expression and returned to the previous, stone-cold all business attitude. This was by far one of the most crucial bits of information he had to give to them, and he wanted to make sure that they understood every syllable he spoke. He could either lead up to the truth through a series of explanations and backstories, or get right to it and tell them directly.

He chose the latter option. Time was of the essence, and he couldn't afford to waste any more of it storytelling.

"Well, my human friend, that is quite simple. You've already met them all."

"W-What?" stuttered Lucena. "How? Last time I checked I've never seen a thunderbird."

Leonard's eyes shot wide open and he lost all feeling in his legs for a fraction of a second. Fiona was at his side in a heartbeat to help him, but he waved her off and grabbed Lucena's attention by clearing his throat.

"I-I have. My father and I fought one outside of New Kannan before he was taken by them."

"That was one of the four unknown...you have to be shitting me right now." said Maya when she instantly recognized where the conversation was going.

"It's them, isn't it. The four unknown Danger Beasts, it's them."

"Yes, Young Maya, they are indeed one and the same. Upon dying, the Four Horsemen, Lucius, Wintorra, Azura and Kanon, transformed into what is known today as Gigardos, Skessa, Xelles and Karkatus. Your enemy is none other then the corrupted and twisted saviors of Humanity."

"Well it would seem we have a lot of catching up to do, don't we?"

All eyes flew up to the entrance to Taiyang's grotto and a mixture of surprised and joyous expressions emerged from the group when they saw, slowly floating down towards them on platforms of pinkish red ice, Morgan and someone hey had never expected to see again.

"Morgan? And _Kahfka_?!" stammered Tatsumi when they hopped off the platforms, Kahfka making them vanish with the snap of her fingers, and walked over to him and Esdeath.

"Listen, we have a lot of stuff to say too, so let's just get the short story of what that dragon told you guys. Then we'll talk to you about why we came here."

Just like he had asked, in a short span of five minutes Tatsumi and Esdeath gave them a run down of everything Taiyang had told them, from the history of the Great War to the fates of the Four Horsemen. At first they were both baffled, but after a few moments they came to accept it as fact and each stared at one another to determine who would speak for them.

"Okay, so why exactly are you here? Kahfka?" asked Leone while pointing at her, the supposed-to-be-dead Assassin chuckling to herself.

"Well, funny story about that. Jacqueline, Roman and I had to rescue the Prince and his parents here from those four Danger Beasts. They attacked the capital and covered it entirely in an impenetrable dome of ice that they guard day and night."  
And so with that to start of their story, Kahfka and Morgan explained what had been happening on their side of the pond, and how their former enemies had actually provided them with shelter and food to recover. When they were done Esdeath raised a hand and Kahfka looked at her, the ice queen shifting her weight onto her left foot and cocked her head to the right.

"There's just one thing I need to know. Who is this Roman guy?"

Kahfka's lips curled up into a grin and looked at Tatsumi with a twinkle in her eyes. "Oh, you didn't know?"

"Know what?" asked Esdeath.

"Roman is Jacqueline and Tatsumi's son, of course."

 **\- Five Hours Later -**

Tatsumi and Lubbock side by side outside the white tower marking the location of Taiyang's library, the others just a few meters away from them finishing up preparations for those who would be departing soon.

"So, you have a son in Straelka too, huh?" asked Lubbock of his friend.

When Kahfka had gave them the baffling piece of information, it had taken everything from Tatsumi to keep Esdeath *and Maya from completely and utterly flipping out. Lucena, Selena, and Juno were all laughing at his efforts, but it eventually paid off when he was able to get them to calm down after telling them the truth of his encounter with Jacqueline after he had been kidnapped.

"Dude, you need to keep it in your friggin' pants."

"Shut the hell up Lubbock." said Tatsumi with the roll of his eyes when Lubbock sniggered at his embarrassment.

"Ah, I'm just messing with you. Now come on, let's say goodbye." he replied, the green-haired General wiping a tear from his eye and motioning for Tatsumi to follow him.

When Morgan had asked for them to help free his country, it was put to a vote and eventually came down to Maya and Juno leaving with them back to Straelka, since they were going to need everything they could in order to take down the bigger threats, Garmr and Tyrant's father. With their packs set Tatsumi bid farewell to Maya and his third daughter with a kiss and a hug respectively, his gaze following them like a sniper's when they stepped stepped onto some ice platforms Kahfka had created and flew away with her and Morgan.

"They'll be fine, Dad. Maya has Imperator, and we all know Juno can handle herself *quite well." said Selena, her father grimacing at a memory of Juno landing a devastating blow on his nether regions during a sparring session.

"Don't remind me."

Suddenly they were all treated by an unexpected visit by Taiyang, who had left his grotto and emerged from one of the tower's windows and lowered himself down to their level. "So, my young human friends, have we come to a resolution?"

"Yes. We've decided that we're going to head to the Empire first and take out Tyrant's father, and once that it done we'll head to the Western Nations to defeat Garmr. Once that's done, we'll find Mephisto and end this whole ordeal hopefully with the others when they take care of business in Straelka." said Esdeath as the voice of the group, the dragon slowly nodding his head.

"Very well. I wish you the best of luck my friends. The wind is my ears, so if any of you requires my assistance, I will surely hear you and come to your aid."

The dragon then withdrew himself back into the bowels of his library, Kaminari going with him after waving goodbye to his friends. When they were both gone with the wind, Esdeath turned towards the group and nod her head towards Lucena as she motioned with a hand wave back towards their home.

"Well, Lucena, lead on."

"M-Mom? What? Why me?" stammered Lucena, who was expecting her parents to be the one to take them back.

"Lucena, I can't control ice as well as I could twenty years ago. I mean sure, I can still kick your father's ass all day long-"

"Hey!"

"But at the same time, it's your time now. We had our fun, so it's time for you all to take the lead." finished Esdeath after holding in a laugh from Tatsumi's interruption.

"I second that notion. Leonard, you're definitely your father's son, so you go and get him. I'll just be here to help if needed." added on Fiona while she winked at Leonard, who grinned as he slipped on his helmet.

"We've got some big shoes to fill I guess. Come on, let's get back as soon as we can." said Selena when she wrapped her arm around her sister's shoulder, Lucena laughing for a few before she accepted the role and manifested several ice dragon constructs for them to ride on while she created her ice wings and Selena used the wings Gungnir gave her upon its activation.

It was time to their home back, one step at a time.


	64. A Father and Son

A/N Well everybody, spring semester has started for college and I am totally jacked for baseball season, which is coming up in the next couple of weeks. Anywho, starting from now the fillers without any action and all that shit are gone. It's time to kick ass and chew bubblegum, and last time I checked I'm all out of bubblegum. Let's fucking go.

Second matter to attend to is an update on the possible new Akame ga Kill fanfic that I talked about a few chapters ago. Guys, it's become even more likely that it will be written. I've been thinking about a lot of plot points and stuff and it's becoming more and more interesting, especially since I've been hard at work preparing and drawing the characters in the event I do write it. (Plus I just love to draw anyways so yeah.). It's gonna be a whole new cast and I am going to go ahead and say this now, it will follow a storyline mixing elements from the Manga and Anime adaption of Akame ga Kill, but unlike _A Different Path_ , it will not start in the middle of the story.

I've already figured out a title as well, but it is subject to changes the more I think of it. "Akame ga Kill! - Warriors from the East" is what I chose. Other factors I will carry over from this story to the second one is the incorporation of same-sex relationships. It provides for an interesting dynamic and I really enjoyed writing about the interactions between Jacqueline, Kahfka, Lucena and Hikari. (NOT FOR THE REASONS I KNOW YOU'RE THINKING ABOUT. STOP IT. STOP THINKING THOSE THOUGHTS RIGHT NOW.)

Are they gone? Good, thank you. Dirty SoBs. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 63 - A Father and Son**

The plan was as simple as could be. The first place they would be going to would be the Empire, so they could eliminate the strongest advocate Mephistopheles had at his side, Rex Tyrannos. Lucena and Alzora could both tell that Tyrant was feeling anxious about meeting his father not only because it would be the first time since his death, but because he now knew a dark truth he had never learned about his father.

As they sat around one of three campfires Leone had constructed with Akame's help, Lucena and Alzora glanced at one another for a second, the two of them silently deciding who would be the one to talk to him about it.

Alzora rolled her eyes when Lucena won the battle and gave her a grin, inciting the Danger Beast to stick her tongue out before she got up and silently walked over to him. The only other people at their campfire were Tatsumi and Esdeath, who had gone to sleep already, so it was just them and Tyrant.

It would be perfect for them, or Alzora in those case thought Lucena, for her to talk with him. Lucena smiled mischievously when she also thought about how this would be a good opportunity for her to see the reactions between them since she had a suspicion, a very. *slight suspicion, that something meaningful could grow between them.

" _Hehe, let us see what happens…_ "

Alzora sat down next to Tyrant and smiled when he turned to look at her, the man giving her a soft smile before returning his gaze to the fire.

"You okay?" she asked.

"I'm fine, I'm just...thinking, is all." replied Tyrant with a sigh, that immediate response telling Alzora there was something bothering him.

"Is it about your father?" she asked carefully.

He didn't respond and she knew instantly that she had nailed it right on the head. She waited a few seconds before she asked again if he wanted to talk about it, since it would help him get over his apprehension. He had no interest in doing so at first, with with some gentle prodding she eventually got him to sigh heavily and remove his top hat, his eyes remaining glued on the crackling fire.

"Yes, I am worried. It's just that I remember my father from when I was very young, and that he had never told me about his role in the Great War. Maybe it was that he was trying to protect me from his ghosts or something, but…"

"But he lied to you and told you different, I'm guessing?"

Tyrant nod his head once and rubbed his temples in a frustrated manner. He must have been thinking a lot about the truth of his father's past and was digging as deep as he could into it to try and figure out just why exactly he had never told him.

Alzora had to be careful about what she said next considering Tyrant's feelings about Rex Tyrannos. She didn't want to make things worse.

"Well whatever reason it was, it had to be a good one for him to ensure you would never be able to find out about his past life. Your mother must have been the same way as well." said Alzora with a reassuring smile, the hand she rested on Tyrant's shoulder squeezing it a little.

"I guess you're right. The only way I'll really find out the truth is if I ask him in person." he replied Tyrant before he stood up straight and stared at Alzora with that fire in his eyes. "Thanks for this, I needed it. I know what I need to do now."

Alzora blushed at how much emphasis he put behind his words and quickly looked away, the action causing Lucena to snicker under her breath. Now that she had accomplished what she had been forced to do in a way, she walked back over to Lucena and caught a glimpse of the amused expression she had going before she quickly hid it.

"What's so funny?" asked Alzora after plopping down on the rock next to her.

"Oh, nothing…" started Lucena with a grin before her lips puckered up and she made the kissing motion while pointing at her and Tyrant.

Her cheeks turned an even brighter shade of red and she seemed to turtle up on Lucena, her head dropping several inches and her shoulders rising up as if she were trying to hide within herself. Lucena laughed at her embarrassment and waved away the matter, saying she was only making fun of her and that someone like him didn't really express those feelings anyways.

"W-Well...what if he...um…" murmured Alzora, Lucena's smile quickly dropping when she had an epiphany.

"Wait a minute, you…no. Really?"

Alzora made a quick glance at her and then nod her head once, which made Lucena's eyes shoot wide open and made her almost fall from her seat. She caught herself though and immediately engaged in whisper talk with the female Danger Beast so that Tyrant couldn't overhear them. This went on into the wee hours of the night before they all went to bed to rest for the continuation of their journey in the morning.

One of them however had a different plan in mind. After waking up and determining that everyone else was indeed fat asleep, Tyrant fully opened his eyes and slowly picked himself off the ground. He crept out of their like a cat and only let out a sigh of relief when he was far enough away to not be heard in case someone had just woken up.

" _Now that the hard part's over with…_ " he told himself when he took off his top hat, collapsed it into a flat disk, and stuffed it into his jacket.

Then, with a steady breath he focused his energy and left the confines of his human form, returning to the dragon body he had missed for so long. After stretching and flexing his muscles again to make sure everything was in proper working order, he looked to the sky towards the Imperial Capital and narrowed his eyes.

" ** _Father…_** "

With a single flap from his wings he took to the skies and simultaneously turned himself invisible with the uncanny ability of his so he wouldn't be seen leaving. He made one last glance back at his friends and allies and sighed heavily, returning his gaze back towards the horizon where he knew the Imperial Capital would be lying and where, more importantly, his father would be waiting.

Tyrant already knew that his father would have been able to sense them even if they were this far away, so he would have been waiting regardless. There was a reason why he was reputed as one of, if not *the strongest, of all of the Danger Beasts, his prowess being in direct contest with even Mephistopheles.

" ** _Please be alive Arthur. I swear if my father killed you…_** " thought Tyrant as he picked up speed.

At the rate he was flying he would be able to reach the city just before sunrise, and he was already physically and mentally preparing himself for what he was planning on doing. Rex Tyrannos was his father, and he wanted to hear from him why he did what he did during the Great War.

He also felt that it was an obligation of his to be the one to take on Rex Tyrannos. He remembered stories from his father saying many other fire dragons had challenged him for the position of clan leader, and he had beaten them all in order to maintain his spot. It was a sacred tradition of the fire dragons. If you could prove yourself as the strongest of them all, then you would become leader of the clan without any arguments.

Silently he flew through the night, the feeling of the breeze washing over his scales bringing him back to the time when he had been a free wondering Danger Beast, travelling from one land to the next while duping Arthur and his forces when they were searching for him. Ever since he had been reborn as the armors Incursio, Grand Chariot and Imperator, he had secretly hoped that one day he would be able to fly free once again. So right now he was making sure he enjoyed every last second he had like since once he reached the capital...there wouldn't be any time for it until Mephistopheles had perished.

Unfortunately it seemed this time of freedom went and passed by in the blink of an eye when the Imperial Capital appeared directly beneath him. However he was more focused on the large black form resting before the gates of the capital, which seemed to be as lively as ever despite the fact they were under the dominion of a massive fire breathing dragon.

" ** _What's going on down there?_** " he thought to himself as he made his descent towards the city.

Down on the ground, the black form he had see above slowly stirred and opened its blood red eyes, the cross-slit pupils turning towards the sky when it sensed the presence of something. Rex Tyrannos squinted to try and make out what it was, but had a very hard time doing so until he noticed a series of stars blink out of existence for a fraction of a second before coming back to life. He still had not recognized the aura belonging to whatever was making its way to the city, so he picked himself up and got ready to face it when it eventually appeared.

" ** _I wonder if it's the humans I sensed earlier on today before falling asleep._** " thought Rex Tyrannos at first, but he quickly discarded the thought since he knew he would have known it was them the second they had gotten close to the city.

This was something else entirely, which actually set him on edge very slightly. Nothing had ever done this before to him, but after fighting Wintorra earlier on his life and here recently Arthur, who exceeded every single one of his expectations, he was ready for anything.

Suddenly a great whoosh of air came forth from somewhere in front of him and he brought up a hand to shield his eyes from the dirt, the unseen anomaly coming to rest before him. He could just slightly tell that something was sitting across from him, but he still had no idea who or what it was.

" **Show yourself, I know you're there.** " spoke Rex Tyrannos with a guttural snarl, a tiny flicker of flame appearing from behind his teeth.

After a few moments of silence, the invisible Tyrant spoke to his father without becoming visible. " **So...I guess you really can't remember me.** "

" **Who are you? Are you an enemy or friend?** "

Tyrant grinned a little before he slowly unveiled himself, his entire body coming back into existence in a matter on f seconds for Rex Tyrannos to behold. " **The answer to that is simple, Father.** "

Rex Tyrannos nearly choked on the flames he had built up in his mouth and coughed out a stream of smoke, the sudden shock catching him totally off guard. He blinked a few times to make sure he wasn't seeing things, but when he saw the similarities they shared in the color of their scales and the cross-slit pupils they both had he instantly knew his eyes weren't playing tricks.

" **T-Tyrant…? Is it really you?** " asked Rex Tyrannos, his son nodding his head and chuckling.

" **The one and only.** " replied Tyrant as he walked forward so he could stand next to his father and look him in the eyes.

Rex Tyrannos was beyond astounded, the sight of his only son unleashing a torrent of feelings and emotions he hadn't felt in a very long time. His son had grown to be an almost exact replica of him, sporting pretty much every single body feature that had made Rex Tyrannos such a scary and intimidating Danger Beast to see, maybe even more so then him. What made Rex Tyrannos even prouder were the various battle scars that his son had gained from his youth.

" **My son, to see how much you have grown…** " said Rex Tyrannos before he reached forward and wrapped a single arm around Tyrant's shoulders, hugging him and cherishing the feeling of his son.

Then he remembered what Mephisto had said about Tyrant being turned into weapons and he let go, his eyes widening when he doubted himself and his belief that his son was well and truly alive.

" **This...this can't be real. You had been hunted down and killed, turned into weapons to be used by humans.** "

" **That is true, Father, but I was able to live on in those armors thanks to the incomparable life force I inherited from you. Specifically, my original self had been split into three versions of myself that lived on in the armors, and over time I worked to try and revive myself by taking over the body of my wielder, the one who wore the armor my flesh was crafted into. Imperator, the third armor, and its version of myself was conquered and subjugated. Grand Chariot, the second armor, was fused to human named Wave and he was able to conquer that version of myself as well.** " explained Tyrant before he looked directly at the center of his chest and narrowed his eyes. " **And from what I can tell, he was used as the catalyst to bring you back to life. Deep inside of your body, I can feel Wave's Aura.** "

Rex Tyrannos nod his head once now that he understood what his son had said so far, but there was one last piece he had yet to hear. " **And what of the first armor?** "

" **The first armor, Incursio, was the one where the strongest concentration of my original being existed. All of my previous users had resisted my attempts, until I came into the ownership of a young man named Tatsumi. He was the closest I ever came to regaining my original body, but he was able to not only defeat me but...befriend me. We became close allies, so close that I eventually fused the armor and myself to him so that he could gain full access to my strength. Anyways, long story made short, here recently I was made able to gain my original body once again.** "

" **And you came here? Why?** " asked Rex Tyrannos, his suspicion coming out.

" **Father, I wanted to hear something from you. I was told that you helped Mephistopheles try to subjugate Humanity in this Great War.** " started Tyrant, his gaze locking with his father's. " **Please, tell me it isn't true. I don't want t believe it, because I've grown to care for my human friends, and I don't want them to be hurt.** "

Rex Tyrannos opened and closed his mouth, letting out a sigh of defeat. Tyrant's heart ached in response to the action since it was basically a flashing sign that told him it wa true after all, but he wouldn't truly believe it until his father told him personally with his own words.

" **Tyrant, my son...I'm sorry. It is indeed true that I fought against Humanity. I never wanted you to find out because I was worried you would want to take revenge. But, seeing you now, it would seem I didn't have to worry at all.** " said Rex Tyrannos regretfully before he stepped away from his son and lowered his head. " **And it would also seem that there is another purpose aside from you wanting to hear the truth from me. Am I right, Tyrant?** "

Now it was Tyrant's turn to avert his eyes, clenching his fists tightly at thee mixed feelings of anger and sadness. " **Yes, there is. If you're helping Mephistopheles again, then I can only assume that you're intending to hurt more people. I cannot allow it.** "

" **I understand your feelings for these humans, but that is not the case. Mephistopheles has changed, _I_ have changed. It is true that I am watching over this city, but that is the extent of my actions here. I engaged in combat with a man named Arthur Pendragon, and I promised that if he wa defeated that I would not harm any of his citizens. I have kept that promise, and in case you were wondering, Arthur did not perish. I have been keeping a close eye on him, since as a result of our fight he passed out and has not awoken since then.** " stated Rex Tyrannos.

Tyrant kept his joy and relief hidden behind a heavy scowl, his thoughts going back to Maya since she was worried the most about her longtime friend and ally.

" **Even if that's true, I cannot allow you to be here any longer. My friend was used to bring you back to life, and my friends would very much like his safe return. You may be my father, but we are on opposite sides. I am your son, but I am your enemy.** "

" **I see...very well.** " said Rex Tyrannos as he leaned back on his hind legs and started to gather up fire within his mouth yet again. " **If we must fight, so be it. Let's see how strong you have become my son, if you are truly worthy of inheriting my name!** "

In the blink of an eye Rex Tyrannos threw his head forward and unleashed a monumental stream of fire many times larger then Tyrant himself, the dragon grinning as he brought up his arms and unfolded his wings in order to keep the flames from hitting him directly. When the heat subsided Tyrant lunged forward and attacked his father head-on, his knuckles ramming deep into the jaw Rex Tyrannos and knocking him off balance from the sheer force.

The older fire dragon returned the blow at the same caliber Tyrant had given, the father and son hammering away at one another with the strength of titans. Trails of saliva were flung this way and that after each blow they received, yet neither of them seemed in the least bit affected by them.

Tyrant ducked under a punch from his father and spun around quickly, his trident-like tail sweeping around and striking Rex Tyrannos in his left leg with enough force to penetrate through the dragon's ultra-tough scales.

" **Good, good!** " laughed Rex Tyrannos as he fell onto his back, his son pressing his advantage by rearing his head back and spraying an equally powerful fire blast into his father at point blank range.

Rex Tyrannos didn't even bother protecting himself and took the brunt of the attack, tanking it as he picked himself up and launched himself at his son through the flames. He tackled him and they rolled around across the ground and through an innumerable amount of trees, their bodies uprooting any grass and dirt that got caught underneath. Tyrant was finally able to kick his father off after the sixth roll, but as he flew back Rex Tyrannos grabbed his son's tail and yanked with all of his might, pulling Tyrant towards and then over him in a semi-circle through the air.

A grunt escaped from between Tyrant's teeth when he slammed down into the ground, his father letting go of his tail and climbing over top to get in close with his teeth and bite at Tyrant's neck. He roared when several of his teeth penetrated through his scales to the soft flesh underneath and drew blood, the pain lighting a fire inside the Danger Beast that doubled his strength and enabled him to push his father off of him.

" **There is a reason why both humans and Danger Beast feared me!** " snarled Tyrant when, before his father's eyes, he began to adapt and evolve.

His already well defined muscles became even more bulkier, the horns on his head became longer and sharper, his jaw elongated ever so slightly and became wider to incorporate a second, albeit smaller, row of serrated teeth. His hands then suddenly began to crack and like some amorphous form or substance the skin split apart, giving way for a pair of fingers to grow out from the bone of each hand, bringing the amount of fingers up to a grand total of twelve.

Finally Tyrant's tail split apart and became two tails, each with a trident-like protrusion sporting wicked sharp spikes capable of cutting and slashing through even the toughest of armor.

" **Tyrant, y-you…** " murmured Rex Tyrannos in shock and awe, his son grinning as he cracked all of his knuckles and hunkered down low.

" **Something I developed on my own in my younger years after I left home was an ability to adapt and modify my body to suite the situation I'm in. I could survive in any environment, and after every Danger Beast I defeated I adapted and evolved in order to counter against them if I were to meet another of their species again. Stronger and stronger I became, eventually gaining the ability to turn myself invisible so that I could hide from my enemies, until I became the strongest Danger Beast alive.** " explained Tyrant when all of a sudden he leaped forward, catching Rex Tyrannos off guard and leaving him open for him to get tackled back.

With his added strength Tyrant clawed into his father's exposed chest, ripping through his scales and into his flesh in order to cause physical damage to him while he made sure to pin him to the ground. Rex Tyrannos quickly regained his senses and fought back against his son by blowing fire into his face, severely burning one side of his face and forcing him off of him. He retaliated by landing a devastating punch in Tyrant's jaw that caused him to stumble backwards, dazed from the blow.

" **Do not think you can so easily beat me!** " bellowed Rex Tyrannos when he flapped his wings to propel himself into the air, his right hand curling up into a fist mid-flight.

Tyrant grinned at his father for half a second before he spread his wings and turned himself invisible at the same time, the whoosh of wind that followed afterward a sign that he was gone. Like he suspected, when his fist came down, all he hit was the ground as evidenced by the large crater he created with the punch. He quickly began to scan the surrounding area, looking for that slight distortion in the trees or in the night sky so he could get an idea on where his son was.

Unfortunately for him he had played right into Tyrant's hands, for the Danger Beast had not taken to the skies or had begun moving around at all. He had merely created the windstorm to give off the appearance that he had moved, but in fact had only moved to the right just enough to avoid his father's punch and not interfere with the creation of the crater.

He waited for a few more moments before, like a bolt of lightning, he struck out at his father with his tails and knocked him off balance. Then he followed up by emerging from the very air itself to assault Rex Tyrannos with his teeth, claws and tails with such speed and ferocity it left Rex Tyrannos with no chance of counterattack.

With every hit he took, Rex Tyrannos became weaker and weaker in the wake of his son's overwhelming strength. Even he could tell that his time was nearing, and to be perfectly honest...he was okay with it.

" ** _My son...you really have grown…_** "


	65. I Trust You

A/N Tyrant v. Rex Tyrannos, what a way to kick off the beginning of the badassery. Okay, I know it's taking me a while, and I was gonna do it earlier today after I got back from Baseball, but for some reason the wiki is deciding to be a bitch and not load, so when it finally STOPS being a bitch I'll finish the character pages for **Kanon** and **Wintorra**. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 64 - I Trust You**

"He's gone."

Selena and Lucena were confused for a second when Alzora talked to them in such a serious tone after they had just woken up from a deep sleep. Judging by how frantic she sounded though, they could both make a safe assumption that whatever she meant could not be good.

Lucena rubbed her eyes to fix her blurry vision and asked slowly, "Who's gone…?"

"Tyrant, h-he's gone. He's nowhere to be found and I can't sense him at all!" stammered Alzora frantically, the female Danger Beast obviously in distress over their fiery companion's disappearance.

At that the two sisters quickly woke up and ran over to the other campsites, quickly waking everyone up from their stupor and telling them of their predicament. Like a well-oiled machine everything was cleaned, packed, and ready to go when Lucena had created a group of horses for them to speed away on towards the Imperial Capital.

Lucena offered to fly ahead and scout for them, a pair of ice wings coming to life a split second later and taking her high up into the sky just as the sun peeked over the horizon. Even though they were a good distance away from the Imperial Capital, in the dull glow of the morning sunrise she could clearly the bright, towering columns of flames surging towards the clouds in the distance.

" _Dammit Tyrant!_ " thought Lucena out of frustration before she zoomed back towards the others.

"What did you see?" asked Akame.

"Tyrant must be fighting his father alone. We need to hurry!" replied Lucena before a snap of the fingers turned their horses int nimble ice dragons, the Great General leading them on a beeline straight for the Imperial Capital.

Out of everyone there no one was more worried then Alzora, but of course she wasn't going to let anyone else know that outside of Lucena. Originally she didn't really see Tyrant outside of anything more then a friend, but here recently the more she looked at him, especially now that she had seen him in a human form she considered to be quite *handsome...she had started to think of him in a different manner.

" _I swear if you're still alive I'm gonna beat the living shit out of you._ " thought Alzora angrily as she tightened he fists until her knuckles turned white.

The closer they got to the Imperial Capital the easier it was for them to see the fire raging from what appeared to be a clearing just outside the city. They soon identified two distinct beings in the same area as the inferno as Tyrant and his father Rex Tyrannos, however one of the Danger Beast's auras was rapidly becoming weaker then the other.

With the hope that it wasn't Tyrant who was close to being defeated held in their hearts, their ice dragon steeds picked up speed and broke through a final cloud barrier hovering just a half-mile away from the capital's defensive wall.

What they saw could only be described as astounding.

The fire they had seen was all but extinguished, preventing any chance of a forest fire taking root, and that the contest between the two fire dragons had come to a close. It was a miracle that Tyrant hadn't passed out from all the pain he must be experiencing at the moment, for his body had undergone a great deal of punishment that no normal human could withstand.

The entire left side of Tyrant's face was charred black from fire, and his left arm had been clawed off right at the elbow joint, his dark red blood oozing out from the wound like a broken water pipe. Various other gashes and bruises with differing levels severity were also present across his form, and after every deep breath he took he winced when the movement irritated these tender wounds.

Beneath his clawed toes rested his father, who was in no better condition then his son. His chest was dominated by lacerations given to him by Tyrant's claw and tails, and his right arm was bent in such way there was no chance for it functioning properly any more. Rex Tyrannos could no longer see out of his right eye because of a series of deep cuts spanning that side of his face, and both of his wings had been ripped out of their sockets to prevent him from escaping.

"Tyrant!" shouted Lucena at the top of her lungs as they came down from the sky, the fire dragon glancing back at her and grinning weakly.

" **Hello...everyone…** " he murmured tiredly.

"What the hell were you thinking?! You stupid idiot, you could have died!" berated Alzora harshly when she hopped of her ice dragon and stared up at Tyrant.

The dragon took his foot off of Rex Tyrannos and shuffled over to them, bending his neck down so that his gargantuan head was hovering inches away from Alzora.

" **I'm sorry, Alzora, but...I needed to do this. I needed to settle things with my father alone.** "

"Well then you should have at least told us you were going." said Alzora before she pressed her body against the side of Tyrant's face and closed her eyes, a tiny smile appearing a second later. "Idiot…"

The feel-good moment f relief was suddenly interrupted by the vicious cough that Rex Tyrannos let out after he tried to take a deep breath. He rested a hand over his chest and picked his head up enough in order to look at Tyrant with his one good eye and blinked a few times.

" **Hehe...this brings back memories…** " he murmured hoarsely, his son looking to him with softness in his eyes and facial expression.

" **Father…** "

" **Don't worry my son, I'm merely reminiscing is all...I'm finished, and you exceeded all of my expectations.** "

He grunted as he picked himself up with the only arm that was still function and fixed his gaze on his son's human companions, specifically Maya since he recognized her based off of the description a certain Emperor described to him.

" **Human with the light blue hair...is your name Lucena, by chance?** "

"Um...Yes. How do you know that?" asked Lucena cautiously.

" **Your Emperor, Arthur Pendragon, spoke highly of you during our talks. He's at the Imperial Palace right now, recovering from our duel. And all of you, there is nothing you have to worry about concerning the city and its people, I have not harmed a single one of them according to the terms he and I set before our fight.** "

Tatsumi turned to look at Tyrant with a shocked expression, silently asking the dragon to confirm the statement from Rex Tyrannos as the truth. Tyrant nod his head nice with a smile, the reassurance from the dragon taking away the doubts he and the others had about his father's words.

"Let's go find Arthur and make sure the rest of the city is clear of enemies." whispered Tatsumi into Esdeath's ear while maintaining eye contact with Rex Tyrannos. "It's not that I don't trust him, I just want to make sure."

Esdeath agreed and she, Tatsumi and the other older members of the group, aside from Akame, departed from Tyrant's side and entered the Imperial Capital by leaping over the wall. With them gone, Rex Tyrannos felt it was a good time as any to impart hiss final message on his son, who was silently sitting next to him with Alzora still on his hand.

" **Y-You...I recognize your aura...you're the offspring of Abraxas, aren't you?** "

"That is correct." replied Alzora, who was still a little unsure about Rex Tyrannos.

" **Good...my son is going to need someone like you by his side like Tyrvant was to me.** " said Rex Tyrannos, the statement causing her to blush heavily out of embarrassment.

Tyrant's father wheezed and laughed at her for a few moments before he was stopped by a fit of coughing. He could feel his grip on this world slipping and the presence known as Wave inside off his body growing stronger, so before he returned to the land of the dead he fixed his gaze on his son and took a deep breath.

" **Tyrant, my son, regardless of our positions during this troubling time, I am proud to see how much you have grown and developed since the first time I laid eyes on you. And regardless of the steps you take from here on...I trust you are your judgement.** " he said with a steady yet weak tone, his son listening closely and nodding.

Suddenly Rex Tyrannos propped himself up up and leaned in close to Tyrant, close enough to where only he and Alzora could hear and understand what he said.

" **Heed my words, you two… _do not trust_ Taiyang Xiao Long.** " he whispered before he let out a grunt and lowered himself back to the ground, his one good eye beginning to close shut.

Lucena, Selena and Leonard watched in awe with Akame when Rex Tyrannos uttered his last breath and finally succumbed to his injuries...which began an amazing transformation they had never seen before. Starting from his feet, the dragon's body started to turn a dull grey color and decompose into ash and dust while his spirit slowly faded away.

" **Goodbye, Father.** " said Tyrant as a last farewell when his father's body fully turned to a large pile of ash.

Akame's eyes widened when she noticed a presence resting in the center of the mound, near the spot where Rex Tyrannos' heart would have been, and she jumped into action. Even though the grey particles had once been a living, breathing creature, she sifted her way through it and eventually reached the area and with a gasp a plume of ash was blown outward when Wave awoke with a start and looked around, trying to get a grasp on the situation and see where he was.

His gaze fell on the shocked Akame and asked, "Akame? What's happened?"

Before she answered he grunted when she quite literally threw herself into his chest and hugged him tightly, their touching reunion bringing a smile to everyone's faces. Lucena high-dived Leonard and then gave a thumbs up to Tyrant, who nod his head and lowered his hand back down to the ground so Alzora could join them.

At that moment Tatsumi returned to the group and shared a laugh on seeing that Wave had been successfully freed before he told them all to join him, Arthur was waiting for them at the Imperial Palace and was going to tell them more about Rex Tyrannos and Mephistopheles.

" **I'll wait out here for you guys to return, since I'm too weak to go into human form.** " said Tyrant weakly as he sat himself down on his stomach and breathed out heavily.

"Well, since any sensible person wouldn't leave someone in your state out here alone, I'll stay with you Tyrant. Say hi to Arthur for us." said Alcoa with a grin and a wink, the fire dragon rolling his eyes and chuckling.

Lucena looked over at Selena and they both shared a look of amusement with one another before following their father into the capital, whose citizens, thanks to Leone and Lubbock, had calmed down enough after observing the quarrel between Tyrant and his father and returned to their normal lives.

They arrived at the palace gardens and were immediately greeted by the sight of Esdeath helping walk the still recovering Arthur out of the palace.

"It's good to see you again Old Timer." said Lucena warmly when it was her turn to greet the Emperor, the two of them sharing a hug.

"Same to you, my dear Lucena. It's wonderful to see you all alive and well, especially you Wave. I could sense your presence inside off Rex Tyrannos, and I knew it was only a matter of time before Akame and everyone else would come to rescue you." replied Arthur with a chuckle after letting go of Lucena and tipping an imaginary hat towards Wave's direction.

"It did take us longer than expected, but yes, we did end up coming back. Sorry it took us so long, we were getting some helpful information." said Selena with the crossing of her arms.

"Oh? How so? And might I ask where Maya and Juno are?"

Tatsumi, seeing that now would be the time for him to take control of the situation, approached the age-old Emperor and crossed his arms while he stared up at the taller individual. "Well, Arthur, you might want to find a seat. We'll try to make this as short as possible, but there's a ton of information that we discovered while we were gone."

Meanwhile, back to where Tyrant had done battle with his father, the Danger Beast had calmed himself down enough to focus his energy and evolve himself to utilize a similar ability Tyrannus had gained upon temporarily fusing with Vile Blood Curse. Slowly but surely, his wounds started to heal themselves and give his strength back to him, which allowed him to heal even quicker. The toughest struggle was regenerating his severed arm, which took several minutes of concentrated effort and various bouts of grunting, but eventually he was able to regrow the limb and ensure it worked properly.

" **Whew...that took a lot out of me…** " muttered Tyrant before he closed his eyes and returned to his human formed, where as soon as hi clothes finished materializing he collapsed to his knees.

Alzora was there to catch him before the rest of his body hit the ground and gently lowered him onto his back so he could rest, the fire dragon grinning tiredly up at her. "Sorry for making you take care of me like this."

"Don't worry about it. Just rest, I'll stay with you." replied Alzora with a soft giggle as she pushed aside a few stray hairs out of Tyrant's face and switched from sitting on her knees to on her rear.

They stayed there like that for a few minutes, just silently sitting and listening to the sounds of nature all around them, from the birds chirping somewhere in the surrounding woods to the soft breeze blowing through the air that caused the leaves to rustle ever-so-slightly. Moments like these were a rare occurrence, so the two Danger Beasts were sure to enjoy every last second of it.

"Alzora, I want to know something." asked Tyrant out of the blue, the female Danger Beast freezing up.

"What is it?"

"Do you like me?"

Tyrant snorted obnoxiously as he watched Alzora's cheeks light up redder then a tomato and her eyes widen to the point they were twice as big as they were previously. She started to look from left to right while poking the tips of her index fingers repeatedly, the words she wanted to say getting caught in her throat and coming up as a garbled mess that only served to embarrass her even further.

"So I take it that's a yes?" questioned Tyrant with a grin, Alzora lowering her gaze in response and nodding vigorously. "Whew...now I know I'm not the only crazy one."

"H-Huh? What do you mean?" she asked with a stutter.

Tyrant propped himself up on his elbows and pointed directly at her while maintaining his grin, saying, "Alzora, come on, seriously?"

"What? Seriously, tell me." prodded Alzora, the embarrassment she had instantly fading away now that they had moved on past the awkward part.

"Alzora, I'm the last of my kind. I was only able to survive thanks to my sheer will and exceptional life force, and even then it took a considerable amount of time and effort for me to regain my body. The same goes for you. I don't want to get that close to dying again, and I don't want to spend my life wondering the world aimlessly from one place to the next." said Tyrant with a serious expression, his hand then moving on its own into Alzora's, which made her blush come back full force. "I'd much rather spend it with someone whom I can rely on and back me up when I make rash choices. Someone like you, Alzora."

The female Danger Beast pursed her lips and shook her head, her response making Tyrant feel as if he had said something wrong before all of a sudden her hair fell down around his head and her lips touched his. She remained there for a few moments, waiting until she felt she had made her point until pulling away and smiling warmly at him.

"You idiot."

Back at the Imperial Palace, Arthur had to take a couple of seconds to come to grips with the startling new information Tatsumi had just poured into him from their time away. He could easily understand the existence of Taiyang, but to learn that Mephistopheles had been the root cause for a war between ancient Humanity and Danger Beasts was another thing. And once he learned the four unknown Danger Beasts they had encountered were *in fact the transformed Four Horsemen whom one of them is actually his *ancestor, his mind was totally blown to bits.

"T-That's...incredible...to think a conflict of this scale would have occurred…"he murmured, still in shock.

"It's a lot to take in, we know, but as it stands right now we don't have the time to stand around. Rex Tyrannos is gone, and when Juno, Maya, and the others in Straelka take care of the Four Horsemen, it'll just be Garmr that stands in the way of stopping Mephistopheles." said Lubbock to the Emperor with the utmost urgency in his tone.

"So do you think you can help us? Arthur?" pleaded Akame, who was worried more about her daughter then anything else.

"Believe me, I would very much want to assist you in your endeavor, but using my Trump Card for an extended period of time really takes it out of me. And considering I used it for five days straight when fighting Tyrant's father, it's a miracle that I'm still here talking with you all. I'm sorry, but I cannot join you, I must stay here with the people and show them that their Emperor is still here for them."

Discouraged slightly by the Emperor's response, Lucena rebounded quicker then everyone else and smacked her fist into her palm, the confident grin on her face matching her attitude towards the situation.

"Well, that's okay then. Arthur, you get your rest, and we'll head out to the Western Nations to help get back Rafe back. I'm sure you'd love to get your licks in on Garmr right, Leonard?"

"Damn straight." replied Leonard with a chuckle filled more with hate then genuine amusement.

"Then it's settled." stated Arthur as he got up to his feet and dusted off his trench coat, his eyes coming to rest of everyone before him. "Defeat Garmr and then return back here so that we may wait for the return of the others from Straelka. Godspeed everyone, for if what you say is true about your next foe...there has to be a good reason why he is known as the "Supreme War God".


	66. The Crown Fights Back

A/N Oh my god guys, I am so very sorry about the really long hiatus between these chapters, college hit me hard. Also Baseball season is in full swing, so I was swamped with a lot of things. Good news is that this past weekend we swept their series 3W-0L so it was a good time. So yeah, I'm really friggin sorry, but uploads might be really extended out between one another like this. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 65 - The Crown Fights Back**

 **\- Berline, Kingdom of Straelka -**

 **\- 10:30 P.M -**

Even though they had all been to Berline at some point in their lives, since it was the largest port city of the country and final destination for many transport ships from across the ocean, they had never seen it so gripped with tension.

As a result of the capital being held hostage by Gigardos and company, the other cities within Straelka had been put under Martial law intended to protect the citizens. In the absence of the Kaiser and Kaiserin, the current Lord Commander had enacted this order and spread out the limited forces of the military they had since a majority, as well as the entirety of the Royal Air Suppression Forces, ad been trapped in the capital.

"I'll be waiting on the outskirts of the city for you. Try not to take too long." Kahfka had told Morgan, Maya, and Juno before she left them and entered the darkness surrounding Berline.

"Wouldn't it be okay for her to walk with us in public? It's been twenty years now, so I would assume it's safe now, right? Mom?" asked Juno as she walked with Morgan and her mother through the empty outer streets of Berline.

A few minutes prior they had arrived at the city under the cover of darkness and from the sky they had spotted lights, which belonged to the soldiers and tanks patrolling the city streets, so it would only be a matter of time before they encountered one.

"Not really. Jacqueline sent someone here that assassinated my grandparents, which brought out a lot of hate for her and anyone associated with her." explained Morgan with a blank expression when they rounded a corner. "A lot of soldiers from the revolution brought back with them brought back stories of her and Kahfka, so even if its been twenty years she would still be recognized."

"Oh...sorry I asked." replied Juno timidly.

"They chose to live this life to repent for everyone they hurt and everything they destroyed. That's all there is to it." said Maya with a stern look on her face to her daughter.

Juno nod her head and they continued walking silently through the streets, taking their time walking to ensure they didn't sound like marauders or any other noisy problem that could put a nearby patrol on edge.

Suddenly an immensely bright light appeared farther down the street from around a corner, the change in brightness blinding the three of them for a few seconds. Several shouts of alarm were cast their way and once Morgan's eyes adjusted he saw several black figures jogging toward them, his immediate reaction being to grip his Teigu and get ready to fight. He had to stop and remind himself they were Straelkan soldiers, his kind, so he could lower the shield and remain perfectly still with Maya and Juno so the soldiers didn't perceive them ass threats.

"Halt! Who goes there!?" called out of the Straelkan soldiers as he and four others armed with rifles approached them.

"We're friends! It's I, Prince Morgan! I also have the Empire's former Great General and current Prime Minister with me!" responded Morgan clearly and with authority.

The soldier holding the flashlight shined it directly on him and with a series of gasps they quickly recognized him as who he said he was, their rifles coming down to their sides a second later. They are instantly made ecstatic by the return of their Prince and were about to flood him with questions pertaining to the disappearance of him and his parents, but thanks to the timely intervention of Maya they were kept at bay long enough for her to request they be taken to the commanding officer in charge of protecting the city.

"Oh, well you're in luck. The Lord Commander is here right now directing operations for Berline and the rest of the cities."

"Really?" said Morgan, clearly baffled. " _She's_ here?"

The soldier nodded and without any further commotion he and his platoon led them deeper into the city, passing by several other patrols consisting of men and upgraded caterpillar tanks on their route toward a very familiar and well-known landmark.

Soon enough the large battle tower that overlooked the plaza and docks of Berline appeared from the skyline, the very same tower from which the armed forces of Straelka marched past twenty years prior to join their princess turned Kaiserin in fighting the corrupt Empire of old.

The soldier left his platoon to personally take them into the tower and up its interior to where the Lord Commander resided, something they were all eagerly awaiting. The steam-powered elevators made that journey even quicker for them, and in no time at all they reached a floor dominated only by a hallway and a pair of oak doors hiding a room beyond their view.

"Just head straight through those doors." said the soldier when they stepped out of the elevator.

"Thank you." replied Maya with a warm smile, the soldier tipping his head to her and winking before she shut the elevator doors.

"So...who exactly are we meeting with? I know it's the Lord Commander, but, who?" asked Juno.

"She's an old friend of mine, who I personally haven't seen in a _long_ time."

Maya and Morgan approached the twin oak doors with Jun and pushed, the doors swinging inward without any effort from the Straelkan Prince. The group of three walked into a fairly lavish boardroom complete with a large table, several chairs placed around said table, and a dry-erase board with markers, the only part not matching the office-like environment being the person that stood only a few feet away from them.

They didn't even have to introduce themselves when the Lord Commander perked up and grinned, the shadows cast onto her reddish-pink hair shifting as she turned to face them.

"Maya, freaking, Gleipnir. It's so good to see you again."

"It's good to see you again too, Chelsea. It's been too long." said Maya before embracing the Lord Commander, the former Night Raid member turned Jaeger.

A few minutes were taken to introduce Juno to Chelsea, since the former had not met her before but most certainly heard of her. Maya asked if she still had the Teigu she used, Gaea Foundation, and with a grin she pointed over her shoulder to the cosmetic case sitting on the table behind her. The only addition she had made to the Teigu was a shoulder strap that would make it easier for her to carry it around instead of using the handle already built into the box.

"Do you still even use that thing?" asked Maya when they all took a seat at the board table.

"From time to time. Only to sneak out and get some fresh air, since being Lord Commander brings in some work _especially_ with what's happened here recently." replied Chelsea with a sigh. "Seriously I don't know how you pulled it off being the Great General back home. Speaking of home, what's happened over there?"

"That's what we've come to talk to you about, so listen up, we'll try to make this short." said Morgan.

He set hiss elbows on the table and with Maya and Juno filling in the blanks since he had also received the short version, Chelsea learned of Maya and Juno's meeting with Taiyang with the others, the truth behind Mephistopheles, Rex Tyrannos, Garmr, and the Danger Beasts watching over Straelka's capital.

Chelsea's expressions fluctuated from shock to awe with every new piece of information she was given, and when her guests had finished she was left to contemplate it all. Learning that the conflict they were embroiled in extended millions of year back to a time where Danger Beasts were even more powerful then what their wildest dreams could come up with and that they were *intelligent was huge. Learning that the saviors of the early humanity had been given such a harsh a cruel fate by Mephistopheles, to forever walk the earth as Danger Beasts unable to die, was even worse.

Thankfully the news of Rex Tyrannos passing and the liberation of the Imperial Capital offset her feelings of despair and grief, but still it took her a minute or two for her to fully come back to her senses.

"W-Wow...that's…" she stated to say before tailing off.

"Believe me...it's a lot to take in, and we heard it directly from the source. In my opinion, the shared heritage between the Four Horsemen and Esdeath, Lucena and Arthur was the one that got to me the most." said Maya with an uneasy chuckle.

"That is shocking, but back to the problem at hand. How are we supposed to fight the Four Horsemen if we can't kill them? And I still need to know what happened to your parents, Morgan." asked Chelsea, her gaze moving to the Prince.

"Oh, right. About that…"

"They're with Jacqueline." said Maya with a blank tone.

" _Jaqueline_? Are you kidding me?"

"Hear us out. Despite her past actions, she provided us with a home and food after Roman, her son, saved my parents and I from being captured and possibly killed by the Four Horsemen." explained Morgan quickly to diffuse the situation, the bad ties Chelsea held with those two rearing their ugly heads.

Her nostrils flared as she let out a hefty sigh and crossed her arms, asking, "So if your parents really are with them, where exactly is that?"

"Out in the Unclaimed Territory. Far enough away from the capital and other cities to not draw suspicion to them." answered Morgan right off the back.

"Second question. Where's Kahfka if your parents are just with Jacqueline?"

"She's waiting outside the city for us. She was going to take us back to her home so we could come up with a strategy." said Juno, which only served to cause Chelsea's eyebrow to twitch.

She obviously wasn't too overly pleased to hear and or speak about Jacqueline and Kahfka again, but knowing that Solomon and Camilla were safe and well took priority over feeling angst about her old enemies, so instead of stewing any longer she calmed down.

"Well...I'm not gonna say I'm totally fine with this circumstance, but I'll take it."

Chelsea then stood up without any explanation and reached for Gaea Foundation, the sheath for her rapier strapped around her waist with a belt clinking against the table's edge.

"What're you doing Chelsea?" asked Maya of the former assassin when she flung the Teigu's carry strap over her shoulder.

"What do you think? I'm coming with you guys." Chelsea replied with a lopsided grin before she pulled out a lollipop and stuck it into her mouth. "Now come on, let's get a move on! We can't keep the Kaiser and Kaiserin waiting!"

Chuckling Maya grabbed Imperator's key and motioned for Juno and Morgan to follow her and Chelsea out through the boardroom doors and to the elevator. It was a short ride to the bottom and she led them to an unused jeep, a brief explanation to her men about her reasons for leaving allowing them to take off from the tower.

Meanwhile, outside the city, Kahfka was beginning to get bored of watching and waiting for the others to show up, so she started to use Demon's Extract to make little ice crystals and juggle them around in the air. Then the roar of a engine reached her ears and she spun around, peeking out over the boulder she was hiding behind and immediately she spotted a pair of headlights moving quickly toward her direction along the road.

" _Finally...took you long enough._ " she thought with the rolling of her eyes as she stepped into the open so it would be easier for her to be spotted.

As they drove along the moderately bumpy road, Morgan kept his eyes peeled for any sign of Kahfka from the front passenger seat while Maya and Juno watched from the back seats. The headlights definitely made it easier for them too see in the darkness of night, but despite this handicap they knew Kahfka's white hair would still stand out like a sore thumb.

And of course, this was proven right in not even a minute.

"There she is." said Maya once she spotted the characteristic hair of the ice-user, Chelsea's foot responding by easing up on the gas and moving to the brakes.

As a joke Kahfka was standing on the side of the rode with her right arm extended, thumb pointing upward, and winked at Chelsea when she came to a stop next to her.

"Heya, long time no see, eh?"

"Kahfka, you've...changed." said Chelsea without any emotion behind her words.

"Oh, why the cold shoulder? I haven't even used any ice yet." Kahfka asked with her tongue sticking out.

"Whatever, just get in the jeep and tell me where I need to go."

Kahfka giggled happily like a schoolgirl as she hopped into Morgan's spit when he moved to a spot next to Juno in the back and made herself comfortable for the long drive ahead of them.

Chelsea stepped on the gas pedal and took the jeep up and over the crest of the hill before them, the Lord Commander sucking down her discontent of sitting next to Kahfka in order to follow her directions.

The moon, regardless of how fast they sped through the peaceful countryside of Straelka, seemed to remain motionless in the starry night sky above them, which also became more and more beautiful and expansive the farther from civilization they travelled. The light pollution from Berline, which came from the few lights that were allowed on, made it impossible to see the night sky for what it really was, but now that they were nowhere near the city the jeep's inhabitants could take in all of its beauty and still crave more.

"The sky here is so different then in the Empire." murmured Juno in awe, the brilliantly colored stars shining above mesmerizing to her.

"Why's that?" asked Morgan.

"I don't know...it just does, I guess. With the Imperial Capital being so bright every night and my position as Prime Minister, I've never really had a chance to look and see what it's really like."

Morgan nod his head out of understanding and leaned back in his seat, the sounds of the jeep's tires grinding against the dirt and the fluctuating hum of the engine growing distant. Even though he was mere feet away from these sources of noise, his ears hardly registered them and heard nothing but a faint buzzing in the back of his head.

"You know, every once in a while my parents would take me to a vacation home and spend a week alone together away from politics and such. One of our favorite things to do was to sit outside in the grass and look at the stars every night, and it never ceased to amaze me and how much we could see." he said unexpectedly after several minutes of silent driving.

"Really? I wish I could do that. I'm always swamped with work…"

By now Maya, who had been feigning a light slumber for the past couple of minutes, immediately caught on to the tone and direction of the conversation and rolled her eyes beneath her eyelids. She cracked one open and stared at her daughter first, then darted over to the Straelkan Prince, then finally at how close they were sitting to one another, and ultimately sighed.

" _Oh boy...I see where this's is going._ " she thought to herself.

"Well, if you want to, you could come back and I can show you some of the best spots in Straelka." Morgan offered up earnestly, his focus shifting from the stars to the lavender-haired woman sitting next to him.

"Well, I...I mean, how would I, um…"

"Relax, Juno. I can take care of your duties for you." spoke up Maya with a tiny grin, her daughter now turning to face her with a shocked expression.

"Mom?"

Maya gave her a wink and her grin morphed into a mischievous smile that oozed with an underlying meaning. "I mean it, take a break, you've earned it. I just hope that a certain Prince will know he has to _ask_ first."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! What do you mean by that?!" stammered Morgan, the blush both he and Juno developed as a result of their embarrassment causing Maya to laugh boisterously.

"Settle down back there, kids. We're here." said Chelsea as she topped a grassy hill and came to a halt, the headlights flooding a cottage in the distance with their beams of white.

"I'll tell them we're here. See you in a few!" chirped Kahfka when she leaped out of the jeep and skipped towards the cottage.

When she disappeared inside through the door Chelsea cut the engine and glanced back over her shoulder, saying, "You know, I really don't like her."

"I know, Chelsea, you probably want nothing more then to see Jacqueline and her dead, but we both know what Esdeath and Akame said." replied Maya.

"Yeah...part of me wants to forgive them, but another still hates them."

Maya sighed heavily as she climbed out of the jeep with Juno and Morgan, her hands rubbing against one another as she recalled the day Tatsumi "died" and the subsequent revival, the forgiveness of Jacqueline and Kahfka by Esdeath and Akame of all people, and other things.

"I don't think any of us have forgiven them just yet, not even Tatsumi. But right now I'm glad we let them live because if they had died, where would we be right now? Morgan, Camilla, and Solomon would probably have been successfully captured by the Four Horsemen." she said quietly, her friend closing her eyes and crossing her arms..

"I guess you're right." Chelsea breathed in and gathered up all of her feelings of apprehension and discontent, the exhale she released also letting go of these emotions. "Okay, I'm fine now. I'll keep myself in check."

It was good timing for her to do that too, because at the moment Juno spotted Kahfka waving at them from the open cottage door, telling them that they could finally enter. Morgan led them down the hill to the wooden building and followed Kahfka in through the door, the group going straight to the living room where Jacqueline, Roman, Solomon and Camilla sat waiting for them.

"Welcome to our humble abode, Chelsea." greeted Jacqueline with that typical smile of hers, the Lord Commander hiding the flash of anger she had and remaining somewhat cold.

"Hello, Jacqueline." she responded, her expressions softening greatly when she looked at Solomon and Camilla. "Hey guys, I'm glad to see that your safe."

"The same can be said to you. Now come on, let's get down to business now that we have Maya and Juno here with us." said Solomon when they all found a seat so they could begin talking.

Maya started off with going through an explanation of the events that had occurred across the ocean in the Empire, leading them all the way up to current events and emphasizing heavily their encounter with Taiyang and the great amount of knowledge he imparted onto them. When she was done, they finally entered discussions on how to deal with the transformed Four Horsemen since they could not be killed, only several wounded.

They als had to keep in mind the safety of the capital in the event the ice dome it was trapped underneath became damaged, so one of the biggest points they were sure to take care of was luring the Danger Beasts away from the city into more open terrain.

"Now comes the difficult part...what are we to do with the Four Horsemen?" asked Chelsea while she stared from Maya and Juno to Solomon and his family.

"We know that Lucius, or Gigardos, can cast lightning. Wintorra is ice, Azura is fire, and Kanon was just brute strength. We need to figure out what we need to do in order to combat them effectively." Maya glanced over at her predecessor and directed the flow f the conversation her way. "Any ideas, Jacqueline? I know you were always one for crafting plans that nipped us in the ass."

The auburn-haired tactical genius giggled at the compliment before she rubbed her chin, deep in thought, and looked from one person to the other as her brain analyzed everyone's strengths and weaknesses in the blink of an eye.

"For starters, we can't try to downright muscle our way through them to the point of exhaustion. They'll just recover because of that venom, and the capital is close by to so we can't risk any large scale attacks. Instead we should focus on attempting to drive them out of Straelka entirely.

She held up her left hand and focused on the pocket of air that hovered just above it, the fingers suddenly closing tightly as she recalled the names of the Danger Beasts and their past.

"Considering the events that took place prior to the death of Lucius, they're obviously going to remain as a group rather then split up if attacked."

"That's true, so how are we going to draw all of them away from the capital?" questioned Chelsea.

"Solomon, Camilla."

"Yes?" they both responded when Jacqueline pointed a finger at them.

"You two are practically masters of Vile Blood Curse, correct?"

"I've mastered it completely, of course, the only problem with Camilla is that she can't perform all of the fire techniques that I can."

Jacqueline nod her head and then turned her attention to Morgan, who perked up now that it was his turn to answer whatever question she asked of him.

"Now you, Morgan, can you perform your Teigu's Trump Card, the Mountain Cutter?"

The Prince grinned out of pride and motioned to his mother, the previous wielder of Claíomh Solais, and stated, "I've mastered my Teigu."

Jacqueline's smile grew as the plan she was concocting came together like the pieces of a puzzle in her mind. Aside from fighting strong opponents, another one of her favorite things to do was crafting plans she would implement against those same opponents, and coming up with one to combat extraordinarily powerful and *immortal Danger Beasts was no different.

"Okay, here's what we'll do. Because Gigardos was the leader, Lucius, the others would still hold close ties to him and desire to protect him. If he were to be injured, it would serve to physically affect them in some way." began Jacqueline before she stood up and paced back and forth, her train of thought now going at a hundred miles per hour. "As such, he will be our priority target. Myself, Kahfka, Roman, Maya and Juno will act as distractions to draw their attention. Then Morgan, when their backs are turned, will use the Mountain Cutter to cleave off Gigardos' wings so that he won't be able to fly."

As she went through the carefully thought out plan, Juno and Morgan were utterly shocked at how quickly she was able to come up with it. Her skill was amazing yet terrifying at the same time, an aspect of her parent's former enemy that made them realize that back in the day she was most definitely a force to be reckoned with.

" _To think Mom had to go against her...she's definitely scary, and I haven't even seen her fight yet._ " thought Juno with a shiver.

Jacqueline suddenly came to a stop in her pacing and smacked her hands together, a victorious look developing with the motion. The final piece of the puzzle had finally fallen into place, her plan coming into fruition in the blink of an eye.

"Once that happens, Solomon and Camilla will create some of those large blood tentacles and bind the other three Danger Beasts long enough for Morgan to do the same to them with the Mountain Cutter. Then we'll decapitate them, Gigardos, Skessa, all of them." she said, her train of thought continuing without braking. "The reason for this is because, like Devil's Heart, which was crafted from Mephisto's heart, if he wasn't able to regenerate since it was removed, then there's a possibility that the same weakness in some shape or form is present with the Four Horsemen."

"So...what you're saying is once we rob them of their limbs and heads, we're gonna cut out their hearts?" asked Camilla to simplify Jacqueline's plan into a more understandable format.

"Exactly. And to draw them from the capital on the chance that, like Vile Blood Curse, their bodies can regenerate from their heart, we'll have Solomon toss them as far away from the capital toward the coast as possible. So, any questions?"

Jacqueline crossed her arms and looked around the room at everyone seated, waiting patiently for any doubts about her strategy, but nothing was said to challenge it. Morgan shrugged his shoulders and Maya nod her head alongside her daughter, Camilla, and Solomon. Chelsea merely stared at her, and of course Kahfka and Roman had nothing to say about it, so it was set in stone.

Besides, its not like there were any other convoluted ways out there. This was the only logical way they could go about with dealing with the Horsemen.

"It's settled then." said Solomon to break the silence, his boiling phoenix blood lighting a fire within him. "Let's go take back our city."

 **\- The Bastion -**

Hikari peered into the throne room and shivered when a cold draft blew in from the hole in the ceiling, her clothes doing nothing to keep the frozen knife of air from cutting through her. However she wasn't worried about getting a cold or runny nose nearly as much as how Mephisto was feeling.

They had both learned that Rex Tyrannos had succumbed to his own son and died, freeing the Imperial Capital from their grasp and putting a massive wrench in Mephisto's plans. Rex Tyrannos had been a huge power player and the strongest warrior among them, second only to Mephistopheles and vastly more powerful than even Garmr, who was reputed as the Supreme War God.

Hikari silently watched the armored Danger Beast pace back and forth, from one side of the room to the other, with his hands behind his back and head hanging low. . Because of his helmet she had no idea what type of emotion he was expressing, but just to be sure she remained hidden so as not to disturb and possibly set him off if he was on edge.

Unfortunately, her training as an assassin by her mother could not hide her from the excellent sense of the reptilian Danger Beast.

"Hikari, do not be afraid. I am not angered of Rex's passing, merely frustrated. You may show yourself, my child." said Mephisto when he stopped pacing, his gaze moving to the throne room entrance.

"O-Okay."

Hikari shuffled out into the open door way and tapped the ground with her toe. Mephisto's hardened heart softened slightly at the sight of her standing there worried about him of all people and he chuckled.

" _I've certainly softened over these years…_ " he thought to himself before his hand motioned to Hikari for her to join him.

He plopped down into his throne and leaned back to the right so Hikari had enough space to sit on top of the right arm-rest and let her legs dangle off the side.

"If I recall, I never asked you of your meeting with your friend, Lucena? Did everything go like you wanted it to?" asked the Danger Beast.

"No...she didn't want to listen to what I had to say." said Hikari dejectedly, her talk with Lucena coming back to haunt her. "S-She...I don't want to end up fighting her, I want everyone to get along…"

Mephisto sighed again and he couldn't help but smile when he looked up at the sullen Hikari and instead saw his lover, Noctis, sitting there beside him like she alway had way back when. She desired nothing but peace and even went to war over it, that caring and motherly nature of hers preserving through all of the horrors of that war until the very end.

"I see…"

Hikari looked at Mephisto and gasped when he reached up to his helmet and slipped it off, revealing his face for the first time to her, and balanced it on the other armrest. His messy black hair had developed a slight grey tint to it, but he otherwise looked exactly the same as he did when he lived during the era of the Great War.

"You remind me so much of Noctis. Maybe it was fate that brought you two together."

"What do you mean?"

Mephisto pointed to the sheathed Murasame leaning up against one of the many pillars in the throne room and then to one of his fangs, a twinkle appearing in his eye.

"I never told you this, but aside from being a skilled weapon user, Noctis was extraordinarily dangerous because of the venom she possessed. While mine could transform any being into a Danger Beast and regenerate any injuries that I any person that receives it has, Noctis was a highly potent and lethal concoction." explained Mephisto as Hikari's eyes lit up when she realized what he was referring to.

"Murasame's poison is the venom Noctis had?"

"Yes...it's taken me this long to figure it out, but it would seem that after her death her body must have been preserved somehow and her venom must have been used to synthesize the poison for that sword." Mephisto's attitude then changed to one of longing as he stared at the sword. "I'd like to think that she's still here with me, that she had never really left…"

Hikari was blown away yet again by the Danger Beast and his past, the regrets and sins that he carried on his back so heavy and large that she could practically see the weight itself on his shoulders. Almost instantly the sorrow that she felt about Lucena vanished, her petty problem paling in comparison to what the Danger Beast must be going through with every passing second.

Without a word Hikari gently wrapped her arms around Mephisto's neck and hugged him, the undeclared act of sympathy catching him off guard.

"Hikari-"

"I'm so selfish…" she said in almost a whisper, the traces of tears emerging from her eyes.. "Here I am, brooding about myself and my problems when you've experienced sorrows far greater then mine…"

Mephisto was utterly shocked by how she could shed tears for someone who had committed such heinous acts in the past, let alone it be for someone she hardly _knew_ , leaving him speechless. His lips parted to say something, but he closed them and smiled, choosing to accept the hug in silence.

They remained totally still for a minute or two until Hikari finally let go of Mephisto and sniffled, a few of her tears still present at the corners of her eyes.

"Thank you, Hikari, but do not weep for me." said Mephisto as he used a finger to wipe Hikari's tears away. "I am paying for the grievous sins I committed, that is the debt that I must pay. Having said that, seeing you right now and the knowledge of your relationship with Lucena moves me to pray that you two won't suffer the same fate as I."

He then pushed himself out of the throne in order to place a hand atop Hikari's head and stare directly into her eyes, his smile reassuring her on the inside and alleviating some of her stress.

"I swear that I'll do anything within my power to prevent that terrible fate from befalling you. It is what my beloved Noctis would have wanted me to do."

"T-Thank you…" murmured Hikari before she hugged Mephisto again.

He closed his arms around her slender frame and closed his eyes, the warmth and purity of her soul so alike that of his beloved that he actually believed he was holding Noctis herself. He knew that this wasn't true, but his heart believed it regardless.

" _Noctis...I wish you were still with me…_ "

 **\- Cinigraed, Kingdom of Straelka -**

 **\- One Day Later -**

"Ugh, it always gives me the chills to see those four like this." muttered Kahfka with a shiver as she observed the Four Horsemen from afar.

On her left was Jacqueline, Roman, Solomon and Morgan, and to her right Camilla, Maya, and Juno. Chelsea had returned to Berline to organize the military so that when they Four Horsemen were taken care of they could quickly get into the city to ensure the safety of the people.

They were all hiding behind a large rock sticking up out of the rolling green plains surrounding the capital city, trying to be as far away from the four hostile Danger Beasts without losing sight of all of them.

Gigardos was flying circles above the ice dome-covered capital city, keeping a sharp eye on the surrounding landscape for anything that moved. Skessa and Xelles were constantly patrolling the circumference of the ice dome on the ground, and Karkatus was remaining perfectly still in the direct front of the city.

"Oh? Is somebody a little scared?" asked Maya with a grin, the teasing earning her a death stare for the white-haired assassin.

"No, it's not that. It's just that for some reason, those four...maybe it's because of who they are now, or who they were originally, but I feel like we're fighting something _else_. Not Danger Beasts, but an entirely different type of enemy."

"I'm getting the same vibes, to be perfectly honest." said Solomon with a certain amount of angst in his tone. "I mean, we all know who we're fighting against, right? These are the Four-fucking-Horsemen we're talking about...these guys were kicking ass long before the Teigu had become even an idea."

"They're most definitely a force to be reckoned with." added Jacqueline.

The gravity of their situation increased tenfold when one of the Horsemen, the transformed Azura, came to a halt in her stalking around the ice dome and turned her head towards them. Not in their general direction, but _straight_ at their location, the devilish gaze of the fire spewing demon fox sending waves of chills coursing up and down their spines.

She knew that they were there, watching them. It was if she was daring them to get close, to try and take them on.

" _Do it_." she seemed to say, those golden eyes of hers radiating with such uncontrollable hate and power that it could barely be contained.

It was so unsettling that it took them all a few seconds to realize the other three Horsemen had stopped, Gigardos coming to rest atop the ice dome with his wings folded up, and were all staring at them. There was no point in trying for the element of surprise now. The Four Horsemen knew _exactly_ where they were, and they could wait as long as they wanted for them to appear.

"Shit…" cursed Maya under her breath as she gripped Imperator's key tightly, the others getting themselves ready to put their plan into motion.

"Stick to the plan. Morgan, go." ordered Jacqueline, the Prince complying by the quick activation of his Teigu and taking to the skies with his angel wings.

"Imperator!" bellowed Maya, the lance in her hands glowing with a bright purple hue as she donned the nigh-invincible armor.

She used the first temporary evolution technique to gain the feathery dark purple wings needed to follow Morgan into the air, the pair teaming up to to execute the first step of their plan.

The others, led by Jacqueline and Solomon, in the meantime made their way down the slope towards the low ground the city rested on. Their sudden movements spurred the Four Horsemen to take action as well, the winged Gigardos flapping his lightning-infused wings only once to get airborne and soar over to meet Morgan and Maya.

"Here he comes! Get ready Morgan!" yelled Maya once she spotted the thunderbird.

"On it!" replied Morgan before he disappeared into the cloud barrier, leaving Maya all alone to deal with the charging Gigardos.

" _Lucius, I apologize for having to hurt you like this._ "

Gigardos swooped down on her and produced a lightning storm from his wings, the bolts lancing out at the armored Maya and consuming her. She grunted a little but she was otherwise unharmed, her armor taking the brunt of the attack and negating it.

"Lucius!" bellowed Maya when she began her counterattack, her smaller body size giving her a speed advantage over the thunderbird.

She avoided his claws and darted right underneath his wings, a well-placed blow with her fist cracking several of his ribs and crippling Gigardos heavily. He attempted to use his beak to bash her, but she avoided him yet again and flew up above him.

"Guillotine Drop!" roared Maya as she extended her right foot out and dropped the heel right into the center of Gigardos' back.

A screech resonated from the Danger Beast as its spine was broken apart into tons of pieces that paralyzed him instantly, causing his wings to freeze up and turn him into a sitting duck.

"Morgan, now!"

Maya flew away from Gigardos when the clouds parted above them and revealed the Prince, his hand held high towards the sky with a massive blade of pure light manifested within it. With a battle cry he swung his arm down and like a hot knife through butter, the blade cut clean through Gigardos' left wing and severed it. As quick a lighting Morgan brought the sword up and cleaved off the other wing, robbing the thunderbird of its flight capabilities.

"It's done! Gigardos has been crippled!" shouted Morgan as loud as he could to the others on the ground.

Jacqueline and Kahfka looked to the sky and spotted Gigardos catering toward them, his squawks of pain alerting the other Horsemen that something was amiss. To speed up his descent, Maya rammed both of her feet into the same spot she had struck earlier with Guillotine Drop and took Gigardos down with her at break-neck speed.

His body acted as a huge cushion that stopped her from hitting the ground, and the resulting shockwave and plume of dust it's impact created caused Xelles, Skessa and Karkatus to freeze.

"There's our window! Now, do it now!" ordered Jacqueline, her partner immediately entering her Cobalt Demon mode and slapped her hands together.

"Everest Aufstieg!" bellowed Kahfka, her Trump Card coming to life in the blink of an eye in the center of the grouped Horsemen.

Caught off guard by the ice mountain's sudden appearance, they were thrown off balance and then subsequently attacked by other large, razor-sharp ice horns that Kahfka grew from the mountain. Solomon and Camilla stepped forward, the familiar blood tendrils exploding forth from their bodies, and fired them off one by one at the the Horsemen to grasp onto their limbs tightly.

"Morgan!" yelled Jacqueline as Maya flew down to her side, her job completed for now.

The Prince swooped down and planted his feet firmly into the grass a few meters behind Skessa, the three headed ice dragon roaring as she tried to break free from the blood tendrils keeping her still. With a single fluid motion he created the ethereal blade once more and slashed clean through the Horsemen at their knees. Blood came fishing out from the three Danger Beasts to create a lake beneath their bodies, their severed limbs dropping uselessly to the ground now that they had been cut from the source.

"Okay, finish it!"

Kahfka froze the underbellies of Gigardos, Skessa, Karkatus and Xelles just to ensure that they wouldn't be going anywhere as Morgan gathered his strength for one final use of his Trump Card. Xelles furiously thrashed around with her body, the nine flowing tails she possessed writhing in agony and rage as she spit fire from her mouth. Skessa was starting to inhale as much air as she could to begin breathing out ice, but the Straelkan Prince proved too quick for them and bellowed his final warcry.

The light blade flew straight and true, evaporating the skin and bone of the four Danger Beasts and decapitating them all. Their screeches and roars were cut off abruptly and their writhing bodies turned lifeless, marking the end of their current lives and starting the countdown until they were revived.

"We don't have much time." said Jacqueline when Morgan rejoined the group, huffing a puffing from consecutively using the Mountain Cutter. "Just choose one and go straight for the heart, we have to cut it out before it can start healing them!"

She opened both of her hands and grew two long and jagged bone shards meant for ripping open flesh, Kahfka formed two ice swords, Camilla and Solomon each developed several cutting tools from their Phoenix Blood, and Maya equipped her sword Carnificem. Juno, since she didn't have a weapon of her own, was going to remain on the side until the gruesome dead had been accomplished, but neither she or anyone else noticed the last second jerking motion coming from Gigardos.

All of a sudden the sky darkened and a hastily summoned thunderstorm spit out several large bolts of lightning, a last ditch effort to hit their opponents from the beyond the grave. Juno looked to the sky and froze when a flash of yellow shot towards her at such a speed it rendered her unable to move out of the way in time.

"Juno!"

She gasped when Morgan appeared in the blink of an eye before her, his shield raised toward the lightning. He grunted when the bolt struck the Teigu full-force and divided into multiple, smaller streams of electricity that ballooned out and around Morgan and Juno and into the ground. Unfortunately his shield was of course metal, so some of the lightning's super-charged particles travelled through the shield and through Morgan's body on its way to the ground, shocking him and zapping away all of his strength in an instant.

Steam rose from his skin as he let go of Claíomh Solais and collapsed, his eyes rolling up into his eyelids when he passed out from the shock. Camilla and Solomon, worried for the safety of their son, were about to run to his side before Jacqueline returned their attention to the Four Horsemen so they could eliminate that problem. Begrudgingly they agreed and started to carve out the flesh of Skessa, pulling and ripping apart her flesh until Solomon grunted and ripped out the still-beating heart of the ice dragon.

Jacqueline and Roman tag-teamed Xelles and with a grin on her face she retrieved the Danger Beast's heart with Roman and tossed it to the ground at their feet, the organ making a sickening plop and squishing noise. Then Maya emerged from Karkatus' stomach, his heart flung over her shoulder, and after she set it down Kahfka walked over with the heart of Gigardos levitating in a block of ice just behind her right shoulder.

"Whew...I'm starting to get too old for this." muttered Maya after Imperator returned to its key from.

"Tell me about it." said Kahfka as she popped her neck, the block of ice containing Gigardos' heart disappearing and dropping the organ next to the other three.

Meanwhile Camilla and Solomon had gone to their son's side and waited for him to regain consciousness, the hope that nothing too serious had been inflicted on their son holding strong in their hearts.

Juno was on her knees next to the comatose Prince keeping him upright, her limbs still somewhat unresponsive to her brain's signals due to the shock from being so close to serious injury or even death. Finally however she got some relief when Morgan came to and looked at her first, his crimson red eyes observing her very closely to make sure that she was unharmed.

"You okay Juno?" he asked with a cough.

"Yes I'm fine, thanks to you." she replied with a smile, the Prince chuckling.]

"Good, hehe…"

Juno helped him to his feet while Camilla picked up Claíomh Solais so she could give it to him once he had full body control again, and when Morgan felt he was fine he took his shield.

They walked over to the others and formed a ring around the Four Horsemen's hearts, which surprisingly had already begun to regenerate arteries at a snail's pace.

"Seems they're going to generate entirely new bodies, but it's going to take them time." said Jacqueline while Solomon bent down to examine the hearts closely.

"The venom must function in a similar fashion to Vile Blood curse. If that's true, then the only way we're gonna be able to well and truly kill them is if we eradicate every single cell. If even a fraction of a single drop of blood remains, they'll come back."

"So then what do we do?" asked Roman, the young man shoving his hands into his pockets.

"If we destroy the hearts, then the venom in their bodies will begin to regenerate in pace of them, which in turn will take a shorter amount of time then if they were to regenerate from the hearts." said Camilla, showing off her deductive side. "What I say we do is destroy the bodies and limbs, wash away the blood, and then take the hearts and cast them into the ocean with some weights attached."

"Good idea. That'll prove to be a difficult obstacle to overcome if and when they fully regenerate." said Maya.

It was agreed upon without any further discussion and they went to work, chipping away at the ice dome little by little until Chelsea and the rest of the Straelkan Military arrived with some more firepower. It took up the rest of the day, but eventually the ice dome shattered and the people of the capital joyously reunited with their Kaiser and Kaiserin.

Through all the celebrating, Morgan was able to slip away and with Maya and Juno helped sneak Jacqueline, Kahfka and Roman away from the capital and public eye. They stopped at the outskirts of the capital behind the dormant volcano, and after making sure no one else followed them out, they proceeded to separate and face each other.

"Regardless of your past, I'd like to thank you as the Crowned Prince of Straelka for your assistance." said Morgan with a straight face to the three outcasts, the former Great General returning his thanks with a grin and salute.

"No problem. It was getting a little boring living out in the countryside anyways, so I needed some excitement in my life." she replied as she tucked some strands of hair back behind her ear and winked. "See you guys later."

"Bye for now!" exclaimed Kahfka with a laugh before she left with Jacqueline and Roman, the small family disappearing into the flowing green grass that dominated the Straelkan countryside.

"For all intents and purposes, I hope we don't see her again." Maya whispered to Morgan, the Prince nodding his head in agreement as they turned back toward the capital.

With the cleaning of the Four Horsemen's corpses and blood completed, the victors transported the large hearts of the Danger Beasts to the coast right next to Berline and proceeded to tie immense weights to them and with Solomon's blood tendrils fling them far out into the ocean. Each organ and weight made a resounding splash and instantly began descending into the deep dark blue depths below, the threat the transformed Four Horsemen posed to Straelka and the world at large becoming extinguished...for now.

" _Okay Lucena, Tatsumi, everyone, we took care of our problem. We'll be coming soon!_ "


	67. Welcome to Hell

A/N Well guys, I am now back at home after oozing to Mississippi for a baseball tourney and unfortunately we did not win ur games. So, to help cope with the sadness I finished writing this chapter so I could release too you guys! Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 66 - Welcome to Hell**

 **\- Imperial Capital, the Empire -**

 **\- The Next Day -**

"Our next target is Garmr, the second most powerful War General next to Rex Tyrannos in service to Mephistopheles. He's not as powerful as Tyrant's father, but he is certainly a threat that should not be taken lightly." stated Esdeath seriously with Tatsumi at her side, the couple addressing this fact to the group assembled before them.

They couldn't leave the recently liberated capital with just the normal stationed troops and a still-weakened Arthur, since Mephistopheles on his own could easily turn the entire city into a crater. So, to compensate, they would split themselves up and have some stay behind to defend the capital while the there's would travel to the Western Nations and defeat Garmr.

After a short discussion and vote, it was decided that the ones to stay with Arthur would be Leone, Lubbock, Tyrant, Alzora, Wave and Akame. Those who would go the the Western Nations would be Tatsumi, Esdeath, Lucena, Selena, Fiona, and Leonard, and it was these people that were gathered before the two former at the top of the capital defensive wall. Fiona and Leonard were definitely more determined and ready to go then anyone since it was Raphael that had been taken and turned into Garmr.

"I don't know if he's able to transform into a human or not, but as a Danger Beast his appearance is that of a three-headed devil hound with blood red fur and the fire manifestation abilities." said Fiona in providing the only information she knew about their target.

"It's better then nothing." sighed Lucena after she finished cleaning the key for Tyrannus with a rag. "You ready to go kick some ass Selena?"

Her sister grinned as she used her foot to kick Gungnir up into her grasp, the spear glinting in the light of the rising sun. "You better believe it. Once he's gone, that'll be one step closer to Hikari."

Resolved with a new hope of seeing their friend again, Lucena created several ice dragons from thin air and hopped on the leader of the pack, the group taking off from wall towards the west where their next battle awaited. Meanwhile, at the Imperial Palace, Wave and Akame watched them fly away with worried looks on their faces.

"Are you sure?" she asked, her husband nodding his head solemnly.

"Yes...that's what they told me." replied Wave, his gaze moving to her.

"What do we do if it's all true?"

Wave stroked his beard gently and sighed, Akame's worry only increasing when his hands disappeared into hiss pockets and he shrugged. "To be honest, I don't know. I just don't know."

 **\- New Kannath, Teppelin, Western Nations -**

 **\- Two Days Later -**

In every sense of the word, the capital of Teppelin and the Western Nations as a whole had been transformed into a literal wasteland. The grasslands surrounding the capital had all been burned away, leaving nothing behind save for a thick layer of ash and some isolated patches of black fire. The city itself had been damaged, with many buildings left as half-wrecked or totally destroyed, as a result of Garmr's rampage earlier on.

And from where they stood, they could easily see that the city had been left as a ghost town. The citizens who had managed to flee from the chaos had sought refuge in the other two nations, and those who haddn't were ultimately slaughtered. Their fates, which consisted of either being eaten alive by Garmr's hellhounds, getting crushed by collapsing buildings, and being burned to ashes by the Danger Beast's fire, were all horrible for any human being.

Now, the city streets were stalked by Garmr's hellish minions who preyed on any unfortunate soul who had been lucky enough to survive.

"That bastard…" snarled Fiona, fingers balled up into fists.

"I'm gonna tear that fucker apart limb by fucking limb." added Leonard in an equally vile tone, their anger so toxic it spread to Tatsumi, Esdeath, and their daughters like a virus.

On the other hand, they thought of the stark contrast between Garmr and the late Rex Tyrannos. The fire dragon had a sense of honor, expecting the deal he had made with Arthur by not harming any of the Imperial Capital's citizens. Even though he had been an enemy, he had earned the respect of them all because of this single act.

Garmr, who hadn't even presented himself, had already earned their intense feelings of hate. When they eventually found him, the Danger Beast was in fr a world full of pain.

"Let's go. I'm itching to break the neck of a certain Danger Beast." said Fiona darkly as her emotions caused small bolts of lightning to emerge from her hair and skin.

While they walked through the ash-ridden field surrounding New Kannath, they were completely unaware of the pair of pasty white eyes watching them approach from the roof of the Parliamentary Building.

"Ho...so the fleas that killed that damned dragon came here?" Garmr mused to himself as he dangled his legs over the roofs edge.

His lip curled upward into a malicious grin as several orbs of black fire blinked into existence a foot behind him, the Danger Beast snapping his fingers to instigate a technique. He snapped his fingers and almost instantly the orbs rapidly expanded and morphed into exact replicas of himself, down to the fiery look in his eye.

They grinned in a similar fashion as the original and stood idly by as Garmr picked up a scythe laying next to him and stood up, the wicked looking blade glowing with an evil aura as he channeled his black fire across its surface.

"Let's give our guests...a _proper_ greeting, shall we?" he asked of his clones, who snickered and laughed as Garmr's horde of hellhounds gathered in the courtyard in response to their master's will.

Meanwhile, Lucena, Selena and their parents had arrived at the city outskirts with Fiona and Leonard, and they were damn sure to be wary of every single little sound that struck their eardrums.

Deep down inside, Lucena wished they could hear at least something moving in the shadows of the full moon, because every step she took on the concrete road echoed like thunder. The roads, the alleyways, the buildings themselves, everything was utterly dead silent.

"This just screams trap." she whispered to her sister, who replied in silence with a nod.

"It really does...I'm getting a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach." Selena whispered back.

Ever so quietly they crept through the barren streets of New Kannath, checking and then double checking every alley and road they passed by to ensure there were no enemies waiting for them in the darkness. The full moon up above offered them some light, but otherwise it was still incredibly difficult to see without another source of illumination.

Then, like a light bulb coming on in the darkness, Fiona came up with the idea to channel her lightning through her sword Kaminari. Like she expected the blade began to hum and excrete a dim yet bright enough electric glow that gave them enough light to see what was in front of them. Eventually they arrived a small courtyard that split up into five separate roads, each leading into a dark abyss populated by an unseeable enemy that they had no clue about if it was there or not.

They were out in the open, surrounded by buildings that offered a perfect vantage point, an excellent place for an ambush.

"I don't like this…" muttered Leonard, who tightened his grip around Enkidu.

Suddenly, without warning, they were all struck with a toxic aura that rendered them unable to breath or see clearly. Fiona managed to pick her head up and gasped when she saw several distinct shadows disconnect themselves from the outlines of the buildings, human-like shadows.

"Well look at who we have here! A couple of stray dogs wandering the streets of _my_ city?"

"And let me guess…" muttered Tatsumi after he recovered from the initial shock and glared up at the man looking down on them, the fiery red hair easily recognizable to Leonard and Fiona.

"It's him, that bastard Garmr." snarled Fiona.

The Danger Beast cackled like a mad man for a few moments, the luminescent moon hovering behind his figure making him appear as pitch black shadow demon with blazing red hair. He finished laughing and bent down a little, his cocky grin serving to piss off Fiona and Leonard even more then before.

"Oh, why the harsh language? I'm merely greeting my new guests in the only way I know how." responded Garmr, a round of snickers emerging from somewhere behind him.

"Who else do you have with you? Because I swear to god if you and anyone else caused any more damage to this city I will tear you apart!" demanded Leonard angrily, the golden flames of his Teigu roaring to life around him in response.

Garmr was immediately impressed by the youth's display of power and laughed in response, the excitement growing inside of him showing itself through his expressive reaction.

"Oh, no one really…" he started, the shadowy figures slowly moving forward into the moonlight and revealing themselves to them.

Lucena gasped and a harsh sense of terror gripped her heart when the light from the celestial body in the sky and from Fiona's sword revealing them all to be Garmr. There wasn't just one of him, there were _five_ Garmr, all standing side by side with the same cocky "I'm so much better then you" look of their faces. They all wielded a similar looking scythe as well, implying they were skilled at using it in combat and would have no qualms in attacking them with it.

"It's just a few lovely gentlemen and I that will be taking care of you this evening." said Garmr when he and his four clones leaped down from the roof they were standing on.

Each Garmr walked to one of the five roads leading deeper into the city away from the small courtyard, the original Danger Beast winking at Lucena and baiting her to follow him.

"Come on, let's play a game, shall we? A little game of hide and seek! Catch me if you can!"

Suddenly the five Garmr's bolted at an incredibly fast pace, disappearing into the shadow blanketing the streets. Without thinking Fiona darted after one of the Garmrs, with Leonard doing the same with a look of vengeance burning in his eyes.

"Dammit, guys!?" growled Tatsumi out of frustration before he turned toward his daughters and held a hand to Lucena.

"Lucena, could I borrow Tyrannus?" he asked.

"Of course, here." she replied before she unsheathed the Teigu's key and tossed it to her father, who caught it and immediately cloaked himself in the characteristic armor suited for him.

He and Esdeath a look with one another before they chased after one Garmr together, Lucena and Selena hearing a call from their parents telling them to be safe and be smart.

"Good luck Sis. Hope you get the real one."

"You too Selena. See you soon." replied Lucena with a smile as she hugged Selena and then formed a rapier of ice in her dominate hand, the Great General the giving chase.

Selena cloaked herself in blue fire and called on her phoenix wings, the constructs providing her with a substantial amount of light that she used to follow after her own Garmr into the darkened streets of New Kannath.

Down one of the streets, Fiona sprinted around a corner after the Garmr she targeted, the Danger Beast's cackling turning her angrier and angrier until she reached a breaking point.

"That's it!" she snarled, her fingers wrapping tightly around Kaminari's handle when she sheathed the blade.

After supercharging it with lightning she stabbed the sword into the ground and summoned two massive bolts of lightning down on either side of her, their impact producing an explosion large enough that wiped out a good amount of street and the surrounding buildings.

She smiled evilly when Garmr was revealed after the dust cleared, her senses and brain telling her that this was the real one. Now was the time for revenge for all of the pain and suffering he had caused.

"Oh ho, you seem to have some *electrifying spirit with you!" exclaimed Garmr enthusiastically as he twirled his scythe around and grinned. "Let's see what you got!"

"I'll kill you!"

 **\- West District -**

"Come back here you bastard!" snarled Leonard as he chased after who he thought was the real Garmr, the golden flames of his Teigu burning just as bright as the fire inside of his soul.

He lashed out with the chain and came within inches of catching Garmr's leg with the ignited knife tip, the Danger Beast taunting him back in response and coming to a stop atop a street lamp.

"Oh so close, yet so far. If you keep trying, maybe you'll eventually come close to enough to graze me!" snickered Garmr, which only infuriated Leonard even more.

The General grit his teeth and held Enkidu up with both hands, the fire on the chains becoming more volatile and uncontrolled with each passing second. Soon it spread to the rest of his body, giving him a god-like aura made of golden fire that impressed Garmr. Then he wrapped the chain around his waist and tightened it, the fire suddenly condensing and turning into a sleeveless high-collared coat that draped its fiery fabric over his shoulders, a pair of horns then appearing from the man's helmet.

"Fear me, Danger Beast. With cloak of fire and will of steel, I am the King of Heroes, Gilgemesh!" announced Leonard, referring to the mythical god king that ruled the equally mythical nation of Pyrsia.

"Oh ho! Now it's getting interesting!" remarked Garmr.

Now it was Leonard's turn to grin when he reached for the glove in his right hand and pulled it off, revealing his hand and a peculiar looking ring around his middle pinky finger. Garmr caught a glimpse of the ring and wondered what the purpose was behind removing the piece of clothing, which gave Leonard plenty of time to prepare the necessary technique in the back of his mind.

" _Thanks for lending me this Kagetane, I'll put it to good use! For your sake!_ " thought Leonard as he brought his hand up and pointed it at Garmr.

"Attract."

Garmr suddenly gasped when his body was launched forward at breakneck speed and pulled toward Leonard by some unseen force. He cursed under his breath and barely managed to maneuver himself out of harm's way in time before Leonard could decapitate him with a blade made of golden fire.

He was about to strike at the General's back with his scythe, but before the blade could come even close to him Leonard calmly pointed his hand toward him and breathed.

"Suppress." he said, the ring on his finger giving off a tiny flash of light before Garmr was thrown away from him like a human missile.

Garmr's body hit a nearby building with enough force to make a regular human's spine shatter and he gasped, a flurry of blood droplets flying out of his mouth after impact. He collapsed onto his knees and growled at Leonard when he held his hands behind his back and stared at him, like he was some noble or god in comparison to Garmr.

"Don't get so full of yourself!" snarled Garmr before he returned to his feet and created several black fire orbs, the deadly projectiles hovering in the air behind him.

"Bring it on, bastard." replied Leonard, who remained motionless.

 **\- Eastern District -**

"Well, of course we got stuck with the friggin Clone." sighed Esdeath dejectedly after she impaled the Garmr she and Tatsumi were chasing with her ice, their fight with the Danger Beast drawing abruptly to a close.

"Well, it's a good thing it ended quickly because using Tyrannus after all this time really took a lot out of me." chuckled Tatsumi.

Esdeath gave him a light punch in the arm and gave him that grin of hers, saying "Well that would mean someone isn't working out like they should be. Hell, I'm over forty and I can still fight like when I was twenty."

"Don't rub it in, for pete's sake."

With their chase now over, Tatsumi and Esdeath looked at their surroundings and quickly found they had been drawn quite a bit always from the others by the Garmr Clone since neither of them could recognize where they were. With the help of an ice pillar courtesy of Esdeath they elevated themselves above the buildings and scouted the city for any sign of the others, Tatsumi being the first to spot some carnage in the distance.

"That must be Fiona." he said when he recognized her characteristic lightning in the midst of what he assumed was Garmr's black flames.

"Come on, let's go help her out then find the others."

 **\- Southern District -**

"Grauhorn!"

Garmr vaulted himself off the ice shard Lucena created directly beneath him, the Danger Beast laughing like a madman as he barreled toward the Great General with tongue hanging out and scythe held back to strike.

Lucena parried him with her ice sword and entered a close-quarters fight with him, their weapons clashing with one another over and over again until she pushed him back yet again with her monstrous strength. She growled under her breath since she was restricted from using her more powerful ice techniques since the city would suffer heavy damage, so she was reduced to fighting Garmr with her sword and smaller techniques.

" _If I had Tyrannus I would feel so much better with this, but I can handle myself without it. I just have to keep that scythe away from me._ "

Meanwhile, on the complete other side of the city far away from all of the action, Selena silently crept through the streets with Gungnir held close to her chest, listening carefully for any offsetting noises. She had pursued the Garmr she had targeted for a while and eventually caught up to it, the resulting skirmish she shared ending in a victory for her since she easily took care of the clone.

After doing so, however, she had a thought that completely changed her plan of finding the others to hunting down the *real Garmr.

" _If I were Garmr, instead of blatantly showing himself to us, I would instead…_ " she thought to herself as she fully left the city and entered the ash wasteland.

She suspected Garmr wouldn't just blatantly show himself to them so soon after what happened with Rex Tyrannos, and that instead he would send them clones and hide his original self far away from the fighting. This would allow him to attack where they would be least expecting it since they would be preoccupied in fighting his clones.

And, thankfully, this suspicion was proven right when standing a few meters away from her was Garmr himself. The Danger Beast sensed her presence and turned to face her, his smile fading away to a frown of a disappointment that didn't register well with Selena at all.

"Oh, so it's only you? I was aiming for that sister of yours, but oh well, I'll settle for you."

"What do you mean?" questioned Selena as she stepped towards Garmr wit her spear pointed at him.

The Danger Beast laughed and suddenly dispersed into a cloud of fire, catching Selena completely off guard. She disregarded the dissipated clone and whirled her head around, her heart beginning to beat at an incredible rate when she watched Garmr's hellhounds emerge from the ash and surround her on all sides.

That's when the _real_ Garmr truly made his appearance, and to Selena's horror...he wasn't alone.

Within his grasp was a heavily beaten and bruised Fiona, and somehow, someway, in his other arm was an unconscious Raphael. The nay way she could think he was there was that Garmr had discovered a way to keep himself alive without having to use Rafe's body as a host, and now that he had no use for him anymore...she didn't want to think of the outcome.

"Well, this is certainly an interesting predicament, isn't it?" asked Garmr with a smirk as he tossed Rafe away to the ground.

Selena waited with sweat bullets streaming down her forehead to see if Garmr's hellhounds were going to do anything with him, and she let out a sigh of relief when they disregarded him and closed the circle around her.

Fiona on the other hand grunted when Garmr wrapped his fingers tightly around her throat and held her up in the air like some game trophy. Selena moved toward him, intending to prevent any more harm to come to her friend any longer, but Garm responded by righting his grip even more and laughing.

This was a situation that Selena did not want to be in, at _all_.


	68. Fall

A/N Aight sweet I was able to roll this chapter out pretty soon. Feeling good about this one! Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 67 - Fall**

"Don't come _any_ closer."

Selena growled under her breath when she watched Garmr tighten his grip around Fiona's throat, making it incredibly hard for her to breath. She was thinking at a million miles an hour to try and figure out a way to free her from the maniacal Danger Beast's grasp, but if she tried anything then there was a chance that she could get injured or worse...perish.

"If you want this girl to live, then I suggest you drop that spear of yours." snarled Garmr while motioning with his other hand to Gungnir, the devil hounds surrounding the two of them also growling their threats.

"S-Selena, please, don't do as he says…" murmured Fiona before she grunted in pain.

Selena glanced over at Rafe's comatose body lying on the ground a few meters away and knew that she couldn't allow his wife to be harmed, so after a split-second decision her fingers lifted off her teigu and let it drop to the ground with a heavy metallic clang.

Garmr smiled evilly and relaxed his grip ever so slightly on Fiona, but even then he still held a malicious twinkle in his eye. "Good girl, you listen well for a human brat. However, I'm not completely satisfied yet, so I'll be holding onto this one for a little while longer."

"What?!" exclaimed Selena angrily while Garmr merely laughed at her reaction. "I swear to god if you hurt her I will rip out your heart!"

"Oh, and I believe it, little girl! But I don't really prefer that outcome. If you really do want to save her though, then maybe you can provide some…*entertainment for me."

Selena looked at the wide eyes of Fiona and though she couldn't speak, she was screaming as loud as she could on the inside for her to just leave her there. Her moral code just wouldn't allow for it though, she wanted to protect everyone she considered a friend, so against her silent pleas she stared Garmr directly in the eyes and nod her head.

"Fine, I'll do what you want."

"Splendid!" said Garmr happily before his smile became even more insane than before. "Now, the terms of our little agreement. I'll free your friend _if_ you can survive against my hell hounds...with nothing but your bare hands to protect yourself."

Selena gasped at the demand and instinctively her body quivered in terror when she looked around again at the snarling hell hounds surrounding her, their razor sharp teeth and blazing red eyes making them appear like true demonic beasts that had risen from the lowest depths of hell to serve their master.

For the first time in her life, she well and truly felt scared. Scared that she wasn't going to be able to save Fiona, but even more afraid that she wouldn't survive. She was scared that she would never be able to see her sisters or parents ever again, that she would never be able to hug them, to love them.

Then she remembered Akio, and her heart twisted itself even more in pain, but after a few moments of despair she expunged the feeling and anything related with it from her system. She couldn't let herself be deterred here, she was going to make it out alive. She _was_ going to see her family.

"Bring it." she growled as she clenched her hands into fists and prepared herself.

Garmr giggled like a psychotic school boy who just got a lolly pop given to him when he snapped his fingers, the signal to his loyal hellhounds telling them a single clear and concise order.

The two hounds closest to her let out a guttural snarl before leaping at her, the General reacting quickly by ramming her foot into the first dog's jaw and then coming around to punch the other one right in the center of its forehead. Both dogs had their skulls bashed in from the force of the blows, and as soon as they were knocked aside another pair of dogs plus one came out from the horde to attack her with their claws and teeth.

Garmr watched in amusement as his loyal followers attacked her from all sides, her defenses slowly crumbling away with each attempt they made. Regardless of how many times she broke their bones and critically injured them, the hellish dogs would just heal themselves again and continue pressuring her so that they might have a chance to injure her. That opening came when she knocked back a dog that had jumped at her neck, another dog sneaking up behind her and plunging its fangs deep into the back of her calf muscle.

She groaned and turned her attention to the dog, grabbing it by the scruff of the neck and pulling it off of her so that she could break its neck. Another dog lunged at her and she used its companion as a projectile that sent it flying back over the horde, her injured leg screaming at her when she put pressure on it.

The dogs attacked again and she held off a few of them at the cost of allowing others to get through her defenses and land deep gashes on her arms and waist, their claws managing to cut through her armor and hit skin.

"Get off of me!' she bellowed as she threw off a dog that had latched its teeth deep into her left thigh, her blooz oozing out of the wounds and streaming down her leg. She was about to punch the dog again in the head but she yelled out in pain when two other hounds leaped up and grabbed onto her extended right arm with their own teeth, digging into her skin and scraping against her bone.

They pulled and pulled with all their might until a sickening pop was heard and Selena screamed as her arm was ripped off from the elbow down, spewing blood onto the dirt and into fur of the hellhounds. The two dogs that had torn her limb off retreated to feast on their snack while Selena was attacked again and again by the remainder of the pack, much to Garmr's pleasure.

Fiona could only look on in pure horror as Selena was quite literally torn apart by Garmr's wolves, their claws hacking into her skin and leaving deep gashes while their teeth ripped flesh from bone. Tears were streaming down her eyes when a huge chunk of her thigh was bitten off and devoured by one of the wolves, racking her body with even more pain, but still she continued to fight while holding onto the hope she would see her family again.

" _Even after all this she still won't give in a let herself be eaten? You humans still surprise me to this day…_ " thought Garmr with a smirk before a new presence made itself known, one far stronger then Selena's or Fiona's combined.

"Selena!"

She painfully looked up as her sister Lucena dropped down from a nearby building and sprinted over towards her, an ice sword at the ready to cut down any and all opposition around her.

"Don't!" shouted Selena, the cry greatly surprising Lucena. "He'll kill Fiona if you get closer!"

Lucena dug her heels deep into the soft dirt to stop herself and stared at her sister and Fiona at the same time, the look of horror painted on her face bringing even more pleasure to Garmr.

"S-Selena, you…"

"I'm fine...Lucena…" murmured Selena with a weak smile during the moment of rest she was receiving from the hellhounds.

The bloody stump of an arm she had left was oozing blood alongside her other various injuries and she was having a hard time maintaining her balance amidst the pain and the dizzy feeling, but still she remained standing. She didn't want to give in, especially since her sister was here now.

"Nice of you to join the party! Although, you arrived right when it was about to end…"

"What do you mean?" questioned Lucena in a low tone, her anger rising the more she looked at the Danger Beast's grin.

He told her exactly what he meant when he brought up his hand again and snapped his fingers, the ears of all of his hell hounds twitching at the command.

It all happened so fast, like a blur, and Lucena couldn't do anything to stop it. One hound lunged at Selena and clawed at her right leg, knocking it out from underneath her and dropping her down to their level. A second hound reared back and clamped its jaws down hard onto her left arm and broke it easily, then a third one ripped off her right shoulder pauldron and bit through her skin deep into her collarbone, causing her to scream to the heavens in agony.

Lucena's body shook in utter terror and her eyes grew as wide as what was humanly possible, her knees giving out moments later and bringing her down. An endless amount of tears began to stream down her face as her heart shattered into tens of thousands of millions of pieces to small to be put back together again.

Garmr couldn't stop laughing when his dogs let go of Selena and allowed her to drop to the ground on the verge of death, the pool of her blood that had been created underneath her growing larger as the seconds ticked on.

"Oh _man_ that is rich! Your pain and suffering, it's so delicious! I love it!" cackled Garmr insanely, the feeling of ecstasy overtaking his system.

However his outrageous laughter was totally silent to Lucena, who was in a whole other world, populated by herself and her sister. She could clearly see Selena's eyes, and the tears, and the blood.

"I will admit, she did entertain me enough to let you go, so here! You can take her back now!" sniggered Garmr before he threw Fiona clear over his horde to the left, a grunt escaping her lips when she struck the ground with her shoulder.

However she wasn't concerned with her personal health or even the condition of her husband, she was more worried with Lucena, who had just watched her own sister get slaughtered by a pack of devilish creatures.

"Lucena…"

"And you want to know something even sweeter? My hellhounds possess a unique venom that when injected into a victim through their fangs, it alters their blood cells so that when they're about to die, it transforms the victim into another hellhound to serve me. So when your sister finally kicks the bucket, you can fight her too! Hahaha!"

The Great General herself, unable to stand the sight of her sister any more, fell forward onto her hands and lowered her head, her tears falling off of her face and hitting the dirt beneath her. It was utterly silent except for the beating of her own heart.

"Y-You…" muttered Lucena in a barely audible tone, her fingers slowly curling inward and digging into the dirt.

"Oh, still have something to say after watching that?" asked Garmr with a grin.

"You heartless...ruthless...bastard…" snarled Lucena again, this time her voice slightly louder then before.

"Yes, thank you for the compliment. Anything else?"

He quickly regretted asking that question when Lucena raised her head up and stared at him with the eyes of someone who had lost all sense of reason, their heart and soul now replaced with every single type of emotion related to anger, rage, sorrow, grief and madness. Her silver eyes were dull and devoid of any emotion, and in an instant his body was paralyzed from his head down to his toes when an devilish killer intent seeped out from the very depths of her being itself.

It was like she had become an entirely different person, her usual joyful and somewhat cocky self getting locked away and replaced by a demonic force brooding with evil.

"W-What, are you trying to scare me with that look? You want to kill me?" he asked in an attempt to hide the terror growing in his heart.

Lucena said nothing as she slowly returned to her feet and remained hunched over, her hand rising to cover the left side of her face. Her eye remained visible through her parted ring and pinky finger, and after a few seconds of dead silence, when it seemed like the tension in the air would actually turn solid, she spoke.

"Massaker."

In a split second the screams of the hellhounds and Garmr all came out at once when she unleashed several twisting tendrils of ice that impaled and utterly slaughter the hellhounds, their blood-soaked and flesh-covered bodies rising higher and higher with the ice tendrils until they formed a swirling structure around her. When the gruesome deed was done, the blood oozing and raining down from the ice turned the pool of blood around Selena into a lake deep enough to reach up to Lucena's ankles.

Her arms fell to her side and she looked away from what had become of Garmr, instead looking at Selena's body and approaching her with slow and steady footsteps. Her feet sloshed through the blood lake until she was standing over her sister, who was just barely alive.

"L...Lucena…"

She collapsed onto her knees and held Selena's head in her arms over her lap, her eyes gazing over her wounds. Her heart was overcome with a sadness so powerful it paralyzed her, forcing her to gaze upon her sister and not look away even when her mind told her to.

"If only I had been here sooner...I could have done something...I…" started Lucena with a quivering lip and a fresh batch of tears, but Selena's vicious coughing overtook her speech.

She didn't have long, and if either of them didn't act soon, she was going to become one of Garmr's hellhounds and attack Lucena the first chance she got.

"Please, Lucena...c-could you do s-something for me…?" asked Selena weakly.

"Anything...I'll do anything for you."

"Tell Akio...what happened to me…" she asked when she began to cry again, her tears spurring her sister to cry even harder. "Tell Aki how his wife died…how she died to protect someone else. He'll understand..."

Lucena nod her head vigorously and Selena smiled out of happiness, but the moment of joy didn't last long when she felt her conscious slip away somewhat and turn more towards the savage and beastial, her body starting to give out on her. She grunted painfully and cried out once before she looked deep into her sister's eyes again, a final question coming into her mind.

"Can I ask you...one more thing…?"

Lucena sniffed a few times and then nod her head once, Selena's smile growing a little before she lifted her broken arm up to her chest and tapped the spot above her heart. "I...I don't want to become a Danger Beast…I...I want to die as myself…"

If there was anything left of Lucena's heart, after asking that question there was no chance of it healing now. She knew what her sister was asking for, and she was battling with herself to decide if she would go with it or not. Hard choices had presented themselves to her many times throughout her life, but none of them could compare to what she was facing now.

"Please…"

"O-Okay...okay…" cried Lucena as she set Selena down on her back in the blood again and raised her hands up in front of her chest, a small, razor-sharp icicle forming in between them.

She grasped it and started to shake immensely, her tears distorting her vision and making it hard to see. Suddenly her sister's grand weakly touched her right hand and stopped it from moving, Lucena's eyes clearing of tears for just a second to see the smile on Selena's face. With a tiny pull Selena brought the icicle to the point on her skin just above her heart, and when Lucena had the strength and will to do it herself she let go and looked at her sister for the last time.

"I love you...Lucena…"

"I-I love you too Sis...I…" whimpered Lucena in almost a whisper.

She gasped when, with a final push, the ice stabbed through her heart and sealed her fate. A single breath escaped Selena's lips as she let go of her body in this world and passed away, her spirit moving on to the next without having to worry about being reborn as some vile and mindless Danger Beast.

Lucena let go of the ice and stared in silence at her sister's peaceful expression, something that greatly contrasted her appearance and wounds, and totally broke down. She cradled her sister in her arms and refused to let go, her lips quivering until with all of her strength she cried out to the heavens with every fiber of her being.

"What was that?" asked Leonard, Tatsumi and Esdeath both looking in the direction of where it came from and gasping when the vile bloodlust they had sensed earlier entirely vanished, instead being replaced by an aura of anguish.

"Lucena!"

Esdeath and Tatsumi led him across New Kannath towards the origin of the shriek, and after leaping past a particularly tall building Esdeath spotted something blue and red towering in the distance. It was only when they arrived at the sight and saw it up close and personal did they realize just what exactly it was.

Four swirling ice pillars covered in blood with the corpses of Garmr's hell hounds either stuck inside of protruding out from them like some twisted gargoyle were resting before them in a circle, and in between them rested a lake of blood deep enough to reach up to their ankles. What made it even scarier was that some of the hounds were still _alive_ , whimpering and groaning as they died a slow and excruciatingly painful death, unable to regenerate themselves.

Garmr was within a fifth column, which was shorter then the others, and he was in an even worse state the his hounds. His body had been split apart where his head, arms and legs were separated from his torso and were individually pierced with ice shards so that they hung like plaques against the surface of the ice column. Garmr's face had an expression of shock and agony frozen on it, the blood dripping from the insertion wound for the ice shard in his forehead dripping down into his agape mouth and then out from his chin.

The whole scene was straight from a nightmare, and it was so ghastly that Esdeath was reminded of the old Empire's torture chambers and the interior of the hellish shed Tatsumi had showed her all those years ago. The traumatic memories were so strong she quickly looked away and retreated into the arms of her husband, Tatsumi sighing heavily and gently running a hand through her hair to calm her down.

"G-Guys...look…" said Leonard nervously as he raised a quivering hand and pointed at something standing in the center of the stonehenge from hell.

Lucena was on her knees in the lake of blood, her back facing away from them. They could tell that she was holding onto something, and as soon as Tatsumi noticed the legs sticking out to the side from behind her figure, all sorts of thoughts concerning Fiona entered his mind.

Tatsumi gingerly stepped into the blood and approached his daughter with Esdeath at his side. He had no idea what to suspect, and his focus was so narrowed down on his daughter that he didn't even see Fiona and an unconscious Rafe to his right.

"Lucena…?" asked Tatsumi carefully.

They got no response from their daughter, and they still couldn't see who she was hiding behind her hunched over form. However, when Esdeath took a single step to the right, she saw the color of the hair belonging to the person in their daughter's arms. She gasped and covered her mouth with her hands as her heart twisted and turned inside of her chest, the feelings of sadness so much that she couldn't even tell Tatsumi what had caused her to freeze up like that.

That's when Lucena finally spoke.

"M-Mommy...D-Daddy…" she said, her head turning around so that she could look at her parents and reveal to them the blood and the tears covering her face...and Selena in her arms. "M-My heart...It h-hurts…"

Esdeath closed the gap between them and she dropped to her knees, disregarding the fact that her clothes and hair were stained by the blood, and cupped the cheek of her second daughter with the touch of a butterfly. Tatsumi walked over to Lucena's other side and got down on both knees next to her, his arm wrapping tightly around her as they all shared tears for Selena.

Leonard, who had gone to his mother's side, remained at the edge of the blood lake to not infringe on them, but despite their stone cold expressions seeing them in such a sorry and decrepit state on this inside they were being torn and ripped apart inside. To see a close knit family such as theirs witness the death of one of their daughters was utterly heart wrenching, a horrifying scene that no sane human could bear to watch.

They say there for a few minutes before a laugh echoed from the fifth column, the impossible becoming possible in a split second. Gamer was actually still *alive through some unknown method, and when all eyes fell on his dismembered body they were shocked to see the ligaments and tendons from each limb start to stretch towards one another.

He was in the process of connecting himself back together, and the entire time he was laughing like some psychopath who had just lost the last bit of rationality and sense he had left.

"Good try, but you can't kill me that easily...you stupid fucking dumbasses!" yelled Garmr with a cackle, the gazes of Selena's family so intense they would have melted his body. "And if you're thinking about trying to get information out of me, my lips are sealed! You'll get nothing out of me!

It only took a few seconds for Tatsumi to come to a decision on what to do with the Danger Beast, considering all that has happened. He may claim that he wouldn't talk, but Tatsumi knew there was one person that would be able to get him to spill everything he knew. He just hoped that they would be up to it.

"Esdeath…"

She took her eyes off Garmr for a second to look back at her husband after her name was spoken. His expression was a mixture of hate and doubt, but ultimately he nod his head towards Garmr and looked at her dead in the eye.

"You can do _it_ …just this once." he started in a low tone, his apprehension making it hard for him to get the words out. "Get the information we need out of him...and I don't care _what_ happens to him."

The look on his face coupled with the heavy emphasis he put on the word "it" told her exactly what he meant, and she gave him an expression that asked "are you sure?" because of his feelings toward the certain _practice_ he was referring to. He nod his head slowly, and Esdeath closed her eyes and delved deep within to retrieve a part of herself that she had locked away many years ago, a part of herself that she had never wanted to be.

" _Just this once...just this once…_ " she told herself as she stood up from next to Lucena and slowly approached Garmr, the Danger Beast's grin widening in glee.

"Oh, so what are you gonna do, huh?" he asked with a giggle.

All of a sudden Esdeath reared back and slammed her fist into the ice pillar and shattered it to pieces, the Danger Beast dropping down right into her open hand where she tightly gripped his throat with enough strength to break a normal human being's neck instantly. That fire in his eyes and tone vanished instantly when he stared directly into the eyes of the Ice Queen, who after a few moments of silence developed a psychotic smile like no other.

"You, my friend, will have the distinct pleasure of witnessing a part of me that no one has seen for quite some time." she said as her family and friends watched in silence, her intoxicating bloodlust and ominous aura beginning to ooze out from her very skin. This was going to be the first and only time Leonard and Fiona would witness Esdeath's forbidden personality, the one that had earned her an infamous reputation so feared, so revered, that it was known across the Empire. He had no idea what he had just gotten himself into, and to be frank the pity they had vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

He deserved everything Esdeath was about to inflict unto him, and more.

"You see, back when I used to be a General for the Empire before the Revolution's success, I was a very, _very_ sadistic woman who relished in the pain and suffering of others. Their screams of pain were music to my ears, but after a certain someone came into my life, I learned it was wrong to be like that and locked away that personality aspect of mine." explained Esdeath with a chuckle before her fingers clenched even tighter around Garmr's throat, a whimper escaping from his lips.

"That certain someone just gave me permission to bring that part of me back just for you. So I hope you have a high pain tolerance, because I am actually going to _enjoy_ torturing you for killing my daughter and for putting my other daughter through so much pain."

With that she snapped her fingers and manifested a thick dome of ice around herself and Garmr, hiding them from the gazes of her family and friends so that they wouldn't have to see just what kind of horrors she was going to inflict on the unfortunate Danger Beast. A few moments passed, the air filled with nothing but utter silence.

Then it began with a bloodcurdling howl of pain and suffering, the cry echoing out from behind the ice barrier Esdeath had formed. Tatsumi had to close his eyes and focus on something else entirely to avoid being sickened by the sounds of bones snapping and flesh getting cut open, his wife performing every sort of unimaginable and horrid torture method she had learned on the unfortunate Garmr.

By this time Rafe had been woken up by Fiona, who showed him as much love as she possibly could, and when his ears registered the sounds of torture coming from the ice barrier he cracked a grin and chuckled.

"Serves you right, bastard…" he whispered hoarsely under his breath, his lungs still not working properly yet.

The entire ordeal lasted for just over six minutes, and it ended brutally with the sharp cracking sound of someone's, easily Garmr's by the secondary yelp that followed afterward, skull and entire neck. Silence took over the encampment again, and then with a clean slice Esdeath formed a hole in the ice barrier just big enough for her to walk out. Her clothes were an absolute mess, with blood from the lake Lucena had created and blood from Garmr absorbed into the fabric, but the short glimpse a couple of them got beyond her into the room of horrors she had created told them enough Garmr was in a _far_ worse state...one that he definitely won't be recovering from.

"Mephisto's based in a fortress called the Bastion far past the Southern Territories." said Esdeath with a blank expression after walking over to Tatsumi.

He had gotten Lucena to her feet but had not succeeded in getting her to speak or say anything yet, so instead of pressing any further he had taken a step back to give her some room considering she was still carrying Selena in her arms.

In a sense she had died, a part of her that is, when she had ended her own sister's life to prevent her from turning into one of Garmr's hellhounds. Even though she was the little sister, Selena was always the one she went to console with and feel comforted by. With her gone...she had lost the only person who she could trust fully with her darkest secrets.

"Tatsumi…" murmured Esdeath in almost a whisper before, suddenly, her knees gave out and she collapsed into her husband's arms. "I don't want to ever do that again…"

"You won't have to, I promise." whispered back Tatsumi as he kissed her on the forehead and embraced her tightly, despite the blood stains dominating her clothes.

"Today was a horrible day…" said Leonard in a low tone to Fiona, who nod her head in agreement.

"Tell me about it…"

They stopped talking when Tatsumi, his wife, and Lucena stepped out of the blood lake and walked over to them, with the unfortunate bearer of Selena's body being Tatsumi himself after he had Gently taken her from Lucena. Rafe, after recovering the feeling in his legs and rest of his body, offered to carry her for him, but he silently declined with the shake of a head. The General understood immediately and stepped aside with Fiona to let him and his family by, only following after they were given an ample amount of space so that they wouldn't feel clustered.

With their business in the Western Nations now completed, they wanted to return to the Imperial Capital and give Selena a proper burial...and give Lucena the chance to fulfil her promise and tell Akio of her passing.

 **\- Three Days Later -**

Lucena walked alone across the wall protecting the Imperial Capital, her head hung low and her breaths shallow and empty. Just a an hour before she had went to the house her sister owned with Akio and told him the dreadful news, and the be honest it was just as painful as watching her sister die in her arms. The look of sorrow he developed once he processed the words she told him felt like a knife had driven itself through her heart, forcing her to quickly leave and say another apology before she broke down into another crying fit at the doorstep to the house.

Not wanting to talk with anyone, she took herself and her pain to the top of the wall and proceeded to walk its circumference at a slow and steady pace, the peaceful sounds of nature doing everything in their power to help soothe her soul.

" _Selena...I-I feel so cold…_ "

She came to a stop and looked to the right, finding herself mere inches away from the sheer drop off the edge of the wall to the ground. Her empty eyes blinked once and the fist she had clenched unwound itself, the thoughts in her head becoming more profound with each passing second.

" _I feel so cold w-without you here...if I had been there sooner, if I…_ " she thought as she took a single step forward, the toes of her heels now hanging over the ledge. " _It's all my fault. I killed you. I killed you._ "

Those same three words repeated themselves over and over and over in her head, the intensity of each sentence rising every time until she was practically yelling at herself. Then, as quickly as they had started, they ended and her mind became a blank, empty wasteland devoid of any thoughts except for one and one alone. She took off her cap and rested it at her feet, the wind picking up somewhat and blowing softly through her hair as she looked straight down at the ground.

" _Mom, Dad, I'm sorry for killing Selena...it's all my fault. I'm the big sister that was supposed to protect my siblings, and I failed. I failed to save my friend, I failed to save my sister._ "

She raised one foot up and held it out over the edge, the motion starting to shift her weight forward. When she felt the back of her right heel lift off from the solid concrete wall, she knew there was no going back now.

" _This world doesn't have room for a failure like me._ "

It all happened so quick, her second foot leaving the wall and following the rest of her body off the wall towards the ground. She didn't bother to use her Teigu to create ice wings or any form of construct to save herself, she firmly kept her hands at her side and her eyes open in order to stare death in the face.

With a resounding thud and sound of something cracking...everything faded into black.


	69. Divide

A/N Okay guys, before we get to the chapter, I'm going to be bringing up an important matter that was at the end of the previous chapter. _Suicide_. Everyone, I'd like to say that it is a very real situation that is tough to deal with since the symptoms of depression can be very hard to spot within a person, even if that person were your best friend. Many events can lead to these things developing, and it can lead said person to eventually tip over the edge.

Suicide is _**not**_ the way to go. It is a PERMANENT solution for a TEMPORARY problem that, if help is seeked out and used, it can be avoided. Your life as a human being is the most valuable treasure of them all, and what's more is that there are people, your friends, your family, your loved ones, that treasure you as well. If you were to end your life, they would be so heartbroken its unbelievable, and its a scar that would never be able to heal. _Ever_.

Saying this, to the person known only as " **X** " who left a guest review on February 24th, reading what you had to say was nothing short of amazing. I know you said that you've heard this already from your family, but let me reassure you that they are absolutely, whole-heartedly, 110% correct about the fact that you are NOT a failure, you ARE loved, and that you need to continue on living for not only their sake, but your own as well. Excuse my harsh language, but don't you ever fucking think that for a second if you didn't exist it would be better, in fact, the world would just be a worse place without you. I don't know who you are, what your personality is, what you like or dislike, but I will reiterate this time and time again...YOU ARE LOVED. Don't you _ever_ forget that.

Leave a fav, and to my fellow readers, if you agree with me, please leave a review with a message of kindness to your fellow reader. I don't ask for much, so please, do this for me. I know I'm not the only one out there who believes in this.

* * *

 **Chapter 68 - Divide**

Lucena gasped as she awoke with a start, and immediately she had to squint when she was assaulted by a harsh white light. When her eyesight finally adjusted to the overwhelming whiteness she looked around and discovered there was quite literally nothing around her.

She was sitting in a totally empty space occupied by nothing but white light. Lucena stood up and was surprised to find herself wearing a pure white dress reminiscent o a night gen, and that she wore no shoes or footwear whatsoever.

" _Oh my, this dress…_ " she thought with a slight blush when she inspected it with a closer eye.

She was glad that she was alone in the empty space, since even though she was wearing he dress she was basically naked. The fabric of the dress was thin enough to the point it could almost be considered see-through, which would be the case of someone was close enough to her. Instinctively she covered up her breasts and private area out of embarrassment, but it didn't take her to realize that there was no point in doing so.

" _It doesn't really matter anyways since I'm alone here in...whatever this place is._ " she mentally told herself, the redness in her cheeks fading away.

She uncovered herself and started to walk forward, or what she thought was forward at least. Lucena had no idea what was left or right, and she didn't even want to try to discern what was up or down, if there was such a thing here at all.

Lucena continued to walk for what she thought was an eternity until she noticed the scenery had actually began to change. A floor consisting of shiny reflective white tiles appeared beneath her feet, giving her a sense of being grounded, and then a ceiling of what seemed to be that of a castle's came into existence above her.

She walked a little further and, on either side of her, walls decorated with elegant glass windows exploding with radiant white light that flooded the floor came into existence. Finally she had a sense of direction and Lucena pressed forward down the hallway, all the while marveling at the exquisite architecture used in the walls and ceiling around her.

Finally after another eternity of walking, the hallway opened up into a massive circular atrium that was capped by a large domed roof. Like the hallway, it was bathed with white light coming in through the windows that lined the circumference of the atrium and an oculus built into the roof, which led her gaze down to the most surprising part of the whole place.

Resting in the center of the room, atop a terraced pedestal, was a golden gate that seemed to call out and lure her toward it.

For some reason, the sight of the heavenly gate incited a warmth inside of Lucena that seemed to cleanse her troubled spirit, ridding it of all of her worries and doubts. She took a couple of steps toward the gate and noticed a faint shimmering that existed between the two gate doors, the strange anomaly distorting what she saw through it.

"I wouldn't walk through that, if I were you."

Lucena's body instantly locked up when the voice struck her eardrums, its familiarity so striking she knew who it was without even thinking. The voice like heaven caused tears to emerge from the corners of her eyes, and when she gained the ability to move again she turned back toward its source and felt almost weightless.

There, standing some few feet away from the golden gate and her, was the one person she wanted to see more then anything. The dress she wore was the same as hers, but there seemed to be a faint glow coming from it, a purifying aura so to speak.

"S-Se…" Lucena stuttered, her voice cracking. "Selena!"

The tears really came flowing now as Lucena ran into the outstretched arms off her sister, who embraced her lovingly and allowed her to cry into her shoulder. Selena smiled and lightly stroked Lucena's hair, her sister's shuddering lessening with every gentle touch.

"I-I missed you s-so much. _Hic_ -I w-wanted...wanted t-to…" cried Lucena through the tears and her hiccups.

"Yes, I know...I know." cooed Selena, her voice once again sending her sister into another fit of crying.

She waited patiently for Lucena to calm down and get everything out off her system, and when she sniffled and drew away Selena used her thumb to wipe away any remnant tear drops and clean her up.

"Selena, what is this place? This all feels like a dream." asked Lucena.

"I'll be blunt with you. You're not dreaming...this is Purgatory, the plane that exists between life and death." explained Selena, her concern for her sister now come up. "Lucena, what did you do…?"

Lucena lowered her gaze and remained silent on the matter, which spoke volumes to her sister and told her exactly what happened without even saying anything. "D-Did you…? Lucena...why? Why would you do something like that?"

"I wanted to see you, to apologize…"

"Apologize for what?"

"I-It was all my fault...I got y-you killed…" murmured Lucena, to which Selena shook her head in disagreement.

"No, no not at all. It-"

"Yes it is!" yelled Lucena with fresh tears streaming down her cheeks, her outburst catching Selena off guard. "I'm the big sister that's supposed to protect her siblings, and I failed! I'm just a useless failure…"

Selena was utterly speechless, her sister's emotions and feelings cutting through her like a knife through butter. But she toughened up and placed a firm hand Lucena's shoulder and stared her dead in the eyes.

"No, you're not. You're the strongest and most passionate person I know, and I'm so glad that I got yo be your sister." she stated with heavy emphasis behind every single word. "Me dying was not your fault. Thanks to you, I was able to stay as myself even in death. You saved me from the pain of having to fight my own sister, and I know it must've been so, *so hard for you...but I can't thank you enough for it."

Lucena sniffed a few times and dropped her shoulders, the massive weight on her shoulders pushing down even harder now the more she though about her actions. How would her Mom and Dad react to losing not one but two daughters in the span of three days? And there was still Juno and Maya, who were Straelka with no knowledge whatsoever of what could be happening, what about them? They would be devastated...and the thought of them all grieving and crying and wailing for her pushed her over the edge again.

"I-I'm so selfish…" she cried, her sister comforting her again with a hug.

"No you're not, I know you. You wanted to make sure I would be okay, and the truth is I will."

"She's right."

Selena's smile returned and she let go of Lucena, motioning with a hand to look at something she could not see, and then waited for her to turn. Lucena glanced over her shoulder and gasped, the second voice she had just barely heard through her own cries of anguish belonging to Akio, Selena's husband. He strolled over to them in an all white outfit consisting of dress shoes, slacks, a collared shirt, and a belt, the standard for males in Purgatory.

"A-Akio, you…" stammered Lucena as Akio walked past her and wrap an arm affectionately around Selena's waist.

"I did the same thing as you. After you visited me and told me of my Selena's passing...I just couldn't bear to live without her." said Akio before he lifted his chin up to show a scar spanning one side of his throat to the other.

Lucena knew for a fact that he never had a scar on his neck before, and after she put two and two together, her heart shattered into millions of pieces out of sadness when she realized what he meant.

"Oh my god, Akio, that scar-"

"Here in Purgatory, the method that was involved in your death remains, in some way, shape or form. This scar is mine, of course." said Akio, which served to answer Lucena's unasked question about why she had a dull,achy headache.

That's when she finally registered another fact about his statement, and when he looked at her sister, Selena pulled down the front of her chest low enough to show her the large diamond shaped scar resting just above where her heart is.

"Anyways, Lucena, you don't have to worry about your sister. I promise to look after her for you. It's not your time to be here yet, there's still a lot of unfinished business you have to take care of and there's a lot of people that care about you."

"Wait, so I'm not dead…?" asked Lucena.

"Only if you choose to be, Lucena." replied Selena before she went up to her sister and took her hands into her own.

"Mom and Dad are probably worried sick about you...I don't want them to lose two daughters. I can't stand to know that."

Lucena nod her head and smiled when she hugged her sister for what could very well be the last time. She really made sure to cherish Selena's warm touch for every second she was in her embrace until they separated.

"Mom and Dad are waiting, Lucena, so you should get going."

"Okay Sis."

Lucena walked over to Akio and gave a hug and another apology to him, the Imperial Knight's soothing bringing her a feeling of tranquility. However, she knew they couldn't stay forever and let go of him so he and Selena could climb up the steps to the golden gate.

They shared a kiss before Akio stepped through first, and Lucena was blown away when as he stepped through his clothes seemed to vanish completely before his body turned into light. It was like their disappearance symbolized his soul finally detaching itself from its earthly bonds and becoming truly free, an act that filled Lucean with wondrous awe.

Before Selena began her journey to the afterlife, she looked back to Lucena and smiled, exclaiming, "Tell Mom and Dad that I'm doing just fine...and that I love them with all my heart."

Lucena wiped her eyes clear of tears and nodded, her sister giving her the biggest smile she could before she waved goodbye one last time and stepped into the gate.

Now alone, Lucena turned away from the gate and began her walk back down the endless hallway of light, a new strength driving her on inside. The farther she went she found out her body actually felt lighter and lighter, and that the white beaming in through the windows was becoming more intense with each step to the point it was blinding her.

" _I'm coming home…I'm coming home._ " she thought happily as she let go and allowed the light to totally consume her.

 **\- … -**

Lucena's eyes slowly fluttered open and the first thing she registered was the steady beeping of a heartrate monitor. She observed her surroundings and found herself laying down in a hospital bed with her head bandaged up intensively to stop the flow of blood. She winced as she turned her head to the left and felt a chord in her heart tense up when she saw them in such a sorry state.

Esdeath's eyes were puffy and red from crying, as were Tatsumi's who also had a hand resting on her back stroking her hair to keep her somewhat calm. Lucena felt even more pain in her heart like no other and thanked God that she was given a second chance. Disregarding the splitting headache she had and the tiredness in her limbs, she inhaled deeply and spoke up as loud as she could.

"M-Mom...Dad…"

In a flash Tatsumi and Esdeath whipped their heads up and saw their daughter smiling weakly at them, the shock of seeing her paralyzing them for a few seconds. Overcome with joy they clambered to her side, with Esdeath breaking down into tears and repeatedly kissing her over and over on the cheek while Tatsumi gently hugged her and silently thanked God under his breath.

"My baby, my baby Lucena!" cried Esdeath three times over until she cupped Lucena's cheeks. "Please, please, please don't ever scare me like that again."

"Okay Mom...I promise...I-I'm sorry…" said Lucena weakly.

"Are you okay Lucena?" asked Tatsumi when Esdeath finally restrained herself.

Lucena slowly nod her head and she smiled warmly, a single tear appearing in her eye and rolling down her cheek when she recalled her promise to Selena in Purgatory, which seemed like a dream to her.

"Mom, Dad...I met with Selena." she said, the mentioning of her sister instantly catching the attention of her parents. "She...s-she told me to tell you she's fine...and that she loves you with all her heart."

Maybe it was because they were physically exhausted from having to deal with the possibility that they had lost two daughters, or maybe it was because of the sincerity of her words, but after just looking at each other for half a second Tatsumi and Esdeath both smiled and hugged their daughter and decided to believe her without any doubts.

Now that she was awake, the hospital administered to her a vial of Phoenix blood they had on hand, and soon enough she was discharged in time to see to the burial of Akio, who had been tragically found dead in his home with a bloody knife in his hand.

What Tatsumi and Esdeath hadn't told their daughter was that the doctors overseeing her told them there was almost no chance of recovery for her. After her head had connected with the ground, she instantly fell into a coma and was hurried to the hospital where she, for four days straight, remained confined to a hospital bed with the hope that she would eventually wake up. What happened could only be described as a miracle.

A few hours later, after Lucena had sat with her parents, Lubbock, Leone, Fiona and her family, Akame, Wave, Tyrant and Alzora for the funeral procession of Akio and Selena, she and her parents had to go through another painful experience that was almost just as bad.

Out of nowhere, Maya, Juno, Solomon and Morgan had arrived at the gates of Imperial Capital with the expectation of a warm welcome, but instead they were all treated with the tragic news of recent times.

Maya and Juno both felt such a rush of emotions that they couldn't hold it in for long and broke down, Juno more so then her own mother because she, alongside Selena and Lucena, were inseparable. Solomon and Morgan were also gravely wounded on the inside as well and offered their condolences, and Arthur, who couldn't attend the funeral due to his own physical weakness, offered his apologies by spreading the news of Selena's death throughout the capital.

As a result, left and right, Lucena and her family were told by the capital's citizens of their sympathy and sadness for them and their loss, since Selena had been a well-liked military leader and good person for all.

Upon returning home and going up to her room, Lucena noticed the windows were wide open and that there was a letter resting in her desk. She instantly recognized the handwriting upon picking it up, and she struggled to keep herself under control as she read it.

It was from Hikari, and it brought up so many conflicting emotions from rage to sorrow it made her heart ache.

The letter read, " _Lucena...I...I saw what happened. I...I can't even begin to describe how horrible it must be for you and your family to lose Selena. Trust me when I say I did not care for Garmr whatsoever, and that his actions were uncalled for. Mephisto feels the same way, and he says he's so very sorry for your loss. If you still hate me, it's okay, I deserve it considering the actions I have made. But I still stand beside my decision to help Mephisto, and if you still intend on killing him...I won't hesitate to fight you. Please don't make me do that...I love you._ "

The face of the paper had become wet in some areas because of the tears Lucena was shedding in response to Hikari's words.

She was so conflicted on what to think and how to feel Lucena collapsed to her knees and held the letter close to her heart. She knew no amount hate could topple her feelings for Hikari, but she was still adamant on making Mephisto pay.

Out of habit, she asked out loud, "Selena...what do I do…?"

 **\- Taiyang's Library -**

 **\- Two Days Later -**

"Welcome back Tyrant, Alzora. What brings you two here?"

"We wanted to talk with Taiyang about some things. Is he available?" asked Tyrant when Kaminari met him and Alzora on the first level of the expansive library.

"No, unfortunately. Master Taiyang is in his personal library memorizing new information. It's important to him that he know everything that is brought to his library, so I wouldn't recommend interrupting him."

"Well, we can wait I guess." replied Alzora with a shrug.

"So what else has happened since our last time together? I'm interested to know since all I know from Taiyang is that you guys defeated Rex Tyrannos and Garmr.

At his question the enthusiasm Tyrant and Alzora had drained away along with the color in their skin, which told Kaminari that it hadn't been all sunshine and rainbows for them and their allies.

In a quiet voice Alzora informed Kaminari of Selena's untimely passing and Lucena's brush with death as a result of an attempted suicide. Kaminari, to say the least, was left totally speechless, his own heart clenching up within his chest out of pain for their family.

"My goodness, that's awful...is Lucena okay now?" he asked, clearly worried about her wellbeing.

"She's doing fine, it was an extremely close call. These past two days she's been spending time with her family so she can recover properly with these who love her." explained Tyrant before he leaned in close to put emphasis on his next few words. "The reason why it's because Selena died in her arms. Lucena was actually asked by her sister to *kill her, preventing her from transforming into one of Garmr's hellhound Danger Beasts. She was pretty shaken up."

"That poor girl...I can't even…" murmured Kaminari while shaking his head.

"You should have seen Tatsumi and Esdeath. I had never seen them so emotional before outside of when Tatsumi had "died"...I never want to see something like that again." said Alzora with a shudder.

"Indeed. Now come, I'll treat you to some tea." said Kaminari with a smile, the three Danger Beasts leaving the center bridge network for a kitchen only Kaminari held knowledge of.

Meanwhile, in the deepest recesses of the library, Taiyang let out a heavy sigh after finishing the last new scroll his followers. He closed his eyes and clearly sensed the troubled and malevolent aura of Mephistopheles, his focus honing in on it until he could perfectly tell where he was.

" _Take heed, foul creature of chaos...the eve of your end is nigh._ "

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

 **\- One Day Later -**

Lucena awoke from her slumber and immediately smiled when she felt the arms of her sister Juno wrapped around her waist. The past couple of days she had slept with her in Lucena's bed to be sure nothing else would happen, and Lucena had come to appreciate her concern and love her more for it.

After Selena died she fell into a pretty dark place, a place she was deathly terrified of now, but with every moment she spent with her family she could feel herself being pulled farther and farther away from it. The bond she, her parents, Maya, and Juno shared with with another was strengthened as a result of this tragic event, and it pushed her even further to strive toward her ultimate goal.

" _Hikari…_ "

She heard the sheets rustle behind her and JUno yawned, her eyes narrowing to see through the morning sun rays peeking in through the window.

"Morning Sis." said Lucena as she rolled over onto her other side to face the groggy Juno.

"Hey…Lucena…" replied Juno with another yawn and a stretch.

The covers were pushed back a little by her movement and Lucena was reminded of Juno's tendency to sleep in the nude like her, that specific trait a result of their parents, and she grinned at the sight of her supple breasts that weren't quite as large as hers.

"Y'know, Juno, I just realized something." she said when she propped herself up on her shoulders and looked at her own chest.

"What would that be?" asked Juno while she scratched her head.

"Our family seems to have a gene for large breasts, don't you think? I mean look at these things, they're bigger then Mom's!" exclaimed Lucena, her hands grabbing her own breasts and giving them a little squeeze.

"And this is a serious matter because…?" questioned Juno with a confused look.

"Well I don't know...I just thought it was interesting…" muttered Lucena, her dejected attitude bringing a laugh out of her sister.

With a smile Juno hugged Lucena and nuzzled the base of her neck with her chin, basking in the warmth of her sister. "It's good to have you back Lucena. I love you, Sis."

"Thanks Juno, I love you too." replied Lucena with all of her heart.

Suddenly without warning Juno reached up with both hands and began to fondle Lucena's breasts extensively, her cheeks quickly reddening with embarrassment.

"J-Juno, what're you-?!"

"And you're right, these things are pretty big. How do you walk around without any back pain?"

Lucena freed herself from Juno's clutches by leaping off the bed and scampered a few feet away, turning around afterwards to stare at her with wide eyes. A couple of seconds of silence later and they both laughed at one another, with Juno climbing off the bed and joining her sister in getting dressed and showering. The sisters then left Lucena's room, with Lucena doubling back once Juno had stepped out the door to grab a pile of papers she had resting on her desk beforehand.

She ate with her parents, Maya, and Juno, and when the opportunity presented itself she excused herself from the table and left for some unknown destination within the mansion. When she vanished Maya nudged Juno in the arm and asked about the papers she saw Lucena holding when she exited the room.

"I don't know, to be honest. It's something she's been working on for a while though." replied Juno with a shrug.

The lack of information she gave concerning the papers quickly drew the attention of Tatsumi and Esdeath to her, so in the absence of their daughter they plotted with Maya and Juno to find Lucena, wherever she was, and spy on her to discover just what exactly those papers were for.

Meanwhile, Lucena had finally arrived at her destination and opened the double doors standing before her, their parting bringing her to a circular chamber adorned with windows and occupied by one of her most treasured possessions.

She looked over her shoulders just to be sure no one had followed her before she walked inside and up to said possession, a twinkle in her eye.

"Hello beautiful…" said Lucena as she ran her hand along the surface of a beautifully crafted white piano, the instrument glistening in the morning sun's light beaming into the room.

She pulled out the bench seat and lifted the fallboard that protected the piano keys and carefully placed the papers on the music rack, which in fact were music sheets peppered with notes and scribbled on words. She sat down, popped her knuckles, and position her hands over the starting keys for the music piece she had come up with all on her own. It was titled "Her Song" in red ink at the top of the first page, and she couldn't help but smile when she read the name.

Unbeknownst to her, Tatsumi, Esdeath, Maya, and Juno were all peering into the room from behind one side of the door frame and were waiting silently for her to begin. They all knew Lucena liked to play the piano alone in her spare time, she didn't like playing in front of other people because she would get nervous, so they were all intrigued as to what kind of piece she was going to play..

With a deep breath and a steady hand, Lucena began.

The soft and tranquil shrill of the piano filled their ears, each key like the strum of an angelic harp. It was so heavenly that a choir of angels wouldn't be able to make it better then it already was, Lucena's skill with the piano outmatching anything her family had ever heard of. What shocked them even more was when Lucena began to _sing_ along with the notes.

They had never heard of the song she was singing, but as Lucena continued to pour her very soul behind every word and note she played on the piano they knew it was one coming straight from her heart. Tatsumi and Esdeath immediately understood who Lucena was referring to by listening to the lyrics and they smiled with the traces of tears in their eyes as their hands intertwined.

Unfortunately the song came to an end when Lucena's fingers slowed down on the keyboard and the words coming from her mouth also slowed, her eyes closing shut when she too began to cry in response to the song she sung.

"Without you, I'm just a sad song...I'm just a sad song…" finished Lucena as she held down the last two notes for a couple of more seconds before she lifted her hands up, bringing her self-performance to a close.

She was totally unprepared for the round of applause and nearly jumped out of her seat in surprise when her family entered the room with smiles on their faces.

"G-Guys?! W-What are you-?! W-Were you spying on me?" she demanded in a flustered tone that matched the crimson red skin tone her cheeks had taken on.

"I wouldn't say spying, but...we saw and heard everything. That was beautiful Lucena." replied Tatsumi as she ran a hand through his daughter's hair. "That song is about Hikari, isn't it?"

"Y-Yeah…"

"Don't worry Lucena, we'll get her back. I promise." said Esdeath with that grin of hers as she hugged her daughter, the Great General's flustered state dissipating when she pressed herself into her mother's loving embrace.

 **\- Nightfall -**

Lucena sat up in her bed with a pillow behind her back and a book in her hands, waiting for her sister Juno to come back from getting a glass of water from the kitchen before they both retired for the night. She looked up from the book when hurried footfalls approached her door and suddenly Juno burst into the room, a terrified look on her face.

"Juno, what is it?!"

"Mom and Dad, all of them! They're gone!"

Outside of the Imperial Capital, far enough away where he wouldn't be spotted by the patrols guarding the wall whatsoever, stood Mephistopheles with his helmet underneath the crook of his armpit and a regretful expression.

" _I am truly sorry for doing this, but I had no other choice._ " he thought to the people he knew would be worried as she turned around to face those standing behind them.

Standing perfectly still, as if they were transfixed under some sort of spell or trance, were Tatsumi, Esdeath, Maya, Lubbock, Leone, Akame, Wave, Fiona, Rafe, and Solomon. Their eyes looked glossy and they seemed to possess no life inside of their bodies whatsoever, their limbs just hanging at their sides as if they were merely zombies.

Mephistopheles snapped his fingers in front of Tatsumi's eyes to ensure the hypnosis his serpents had cast on them was in place before he slipped his helmet back on a sighed.

" _I'm only doing this to protect them._ "


	70. To the Bastion

A/N Well everyone, this is it. With this Chapter, 69, (hehehehe childish humor intensifies), we've now officially entered the final stretch, the end game. This story is coming to a close very shortly, and it's become quite literally the longest story I have ever written in my entire life. 400k+ words...wow, it's unbelievable. It' been one hell of a ride, and I can't wait for it all to come to an end in the climax I have planned. Let me tell yah, I think it'll be better then the previous one at the height of the siege of the Imperial Capital. It's gonna be great. Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 69 - To the Bastion**

In the wake of the disappearance of Lucena and Juno's parents, Leonard's parents, Morgan's father, Lubbock, and Leone, Arthur called for those who weren't kidnapped to the Imperial Palace to discuss their next course of action in accordance with the information Esdeath was able to squeeze out of Garmr prior to his death.

"She said that it was called the Bastion, somewhere in the far south past the territories. Uncharted land." said Leonard, recalling Esdeath's words after she had tortured Garmr.

"The Bastion...if I recall the far south region remains unmapped because of fierce snowstorms that are always constantly raging there." stated Arthur as he sstroked his metal chin. "Could those snowstorms be the very same, or at least the offspring of, the snowstorm Wintorra created after killing Mephistopheles?"

"That is highly likely, which means the Bastion is somewhere within it." said Lucena, a grim expression on her face.

"He's baiting us. I have a feeling that the Four Horsemen are healed by now, and they'll be waiting for us in the snowstorm." growled Morgan when he slammed his fist into the throne room's inner wall.

"That could be the case, but I'm detecting an ulterior motive here."

All eyes fell on Arthur, the Emperor tapping his foot against the ground as he psycho-analyzed the situation at hand, the kidnapping, and Mephistopheles himself and his reasoning behind these events.

"What do you mean?" questioned Leonard.

"If what you said about this Mephistopheles character is correct, he would've already annihilated everything in his path by now. Instead, he ordered his subordinate to watch over their assigned territories, albeit Garmr was acting of his own volition. *If he truly hated humanity, he wouldn't have done all of this...and he wouldn't have kidnapped your family and friends. Don't you find this odd?"

Lucena, Juno, Morgan and Leonard were silent, the explanation made by the wise Emperor shining a different light on their views of the supposedly chaotic Danger Beast. Lucena herself was starting to have second thoughts when she remembered Hikari's words from the letter she had left on her desk. What sort of chaotic, human-hating Danger Beast with extraordinary power would feel sorry for the death of her sister, who he had prior knowledge of?

"Well...when you put it that way…" murmured Juno, a seed of doubt planting itself in her heart.

"But then are you saying that what Taiyang said was wrong? That he lied?" asked Leonard with his arms crossed.

"I do not know that answer, I did not personally meet him. For all I know, Mephistopheles could very well be chaotic and evil, and that this is all a trap." said Arthur while he held his hands up defensively. "What I *am saying is that we should all keep an open mind and stay on guard for anything."

"Sir, it's ready!"

Arthur looked back over his shoulder at an Imperial scientist that had suddenly appeared from behind the throne, and he chuckled. He waved at Lucena and the others to wait for a few before he followed the scientist behind the throne and disappeared. Lucena and Juno both shrugged when Leonard and Morgan looked to them for answers, so they waited for Arthur to return to them for those.

They were all in for a surprise when he finally emerged ten minutes later, but as an entirely different person. Instead of towering over them at a staggering 7'9", he was now just under 6'3", but the most shocking part of this new Arthur was that he had regained some of the humanity he had lost after becoming Excalibur. His outfit looked relatively the same as his previous, with the zip-up boots, the trench coat, the dress shirt and tie. It was his head and face that had changed, quite literally the *face is what he had regained.

The metal helmet that had encompassed ninety percent of his head was now gone, replaced with a head full of the green hair that ran through his lineage, and that he now had his face and smile back once again. There were two metal strips that covered part of his cheeks, but other then that he looked the same or at least close to what he looked like when he was still alive.

"Arthur...you...what did you do?" asked Lucena, who was so flabbergasted she had difficulty forming a proper sentence.

"Well, to put it simply, I had a new body made for me, one that can handle the stress of my Trump Card better then the old one. This new body is most definitely a Biological Teigu, so I can certainly eat and bleed like any normal human, but I also possess elements from my old Mechanical body in that I have various machines in my body, moreso around by heart and brain, that can keep me from tiring out for extended periods of time." explained Arthur before a different scientist walked around and handed him his longsword.

"Wait you're coming with us?!" stammered Juno.

"But of course! Now that I'm feeling better then ever before, I want to test this new body out!" exclaimed Arthur with a boisterous laugh. "Now go on, you four, prepare yourselves. We leave tonight for the Bastion."

When the meeting drew to a close, Juno and Lucena returned to their home to change into more proper attire suited for battle, the latter slipping on her normal General's clothes and placing her cap atop her head. Juno, on the other hand, went to her parent's room and stared blankly at the one thing she had not expected to see in there.

Leaning up against the bedside was none other then Imperator's key, the purple and black lance staring right back at her in silence. She found herself getting drawn toward it and she approached the key, a hand wrapping around the shaft and lifting the lance.

The weapon, despite its size, hardly weighed anything at all, and he found herself liking the feel of it in her grasp. Juno closed her eyes and felt a residual feeling of power flowing up from the lance into her own body, which she assumed was the suppressed piece of Tyrant that still lived on within the Teigu. Since she was Maya's daughter, the lance recognized her and resonated with a warmth that felt almost like a bond had formed between her and the weapon, which could only mean one thing.

" _Here goes nothing._ " she thought, her other hand coming to grip the lance's shaft, before she angled the tip downward.

"Imperator!"

She slammed the lance's sharpened tip into the ground and initiated the characteristic transformation of the Teigu and its relatives, a ring off purple enteral fire coming to life around her as the nigh-limitless power of Imperator began to seep out. Her clothes began to burn away and turn into a completely different outfit that suited her inner wishes and desires, and what took shape greatly contrasted the tall, bulky and menacing armor her mother wore whilst under the guise of Magress.

The amount of actual armor was, to be honest, lacking when compared to Maya's version, but it was indeed more beautiful and appealing to the male eye. Armored shin guards and heels protected her legs up to her knees, and she wore an old fashioned dress that possessed a chest plate that fit her bust, side skirts that reached her knees, and detached arm sleeves that possessed gauntlets.

The hidden advantages this new version of Imperator held for Juno was that around her, a barely visible outline of the previous vision, a "ghost image" so to speak, stood around her that acted as a barrier able to protect her from attacks much like a shield.

"Wow…" she murmured before Lucena appeared in the doorway with Tyrannus' key in her hand, expecting the worst case scenario.

"Juno, what's going on?" she asked at first, but upon seeing Juno and the shield, sword, and lance she recognized as the Auxiliary Armaments Impeius, Carnificem, and Leomurg levitating behind her she knew what must've happened. "Is that Imperator, Juno?"

"Yeah, Mom left it here and I thought I could give it a whirl. Turns out I can use it just fine." replied Juno with a grin as she deactivated Imperator and walked over to her sister, key in hand.

"That is awesome! To tell you the truth, I was worried about you since you didn't have a Teigu like Morgan, Leonard and I." exclaimed Lucena happily while she hugged Juno.

"Lucena, remember, Maya was the one that trained me. Even without a Teigu I can still kick ass. But anyways, let's meet up with the others."

Lucena stopped her sister and said she still had one last thing to grab, so Juno left to find the others while she went to a place she frequently visited on her own, since it mattered to her greatly.

The door to Selena and Akio's home always remained unlocked, and thanks to Arthur the property was made private and barred anyone else from entering it without permission, since it was owned entirely by Lucena and her family. She walked in and made the family route upstairs to the room they shared together, her hand gripping the doorknob for a few moments before she exhaled and entered.

Like she remembered, her sister's Teigu was still sitting in the same spot it was left at by her when they had returned to the Imperial Capital from the west. Gungnir's finely crafted blade twinkled in the sunlight it was bathed in, and Lucena felt calmed by its presence since she believed that Selena was still somehow connected to the weapon.

She stood on one side of the bed and gently ran her fingers on Gungnir, shivering slightly at its cold touch. Flashbacks of Selena in her final moments entered her mind like a virus, plaguing her thoughts and causing her to furrow her brow in pain.

Finally Lucena suppressed those images and reached down to pick up Gungnir slowly, the innate power and energy the spear contained emerging from its depths and conflicting with that of Demon's Extract and Tyrannus.

In silence, Lucena departed from the house and went out to the front yard with Gungnir at her side. She cloaked herself in Tyrannus and gripped Selena's Teigu tightly with both hands, as if the weapon itself was her long-dead sister that she still wanted to hold onto and never let go.

" _Selena, I'm going to borrow this for a while. I'll give it back once this is over, I promise._ " thought Lucena before she closed her eyes and activated her Teigu's secondary and most versatile Trump Card.

Within a matter of seconds Gungnir turned into an amorphous sphere of energy that hovered above her cupped hands, its gentle blue glow illuminating Lucena's face and chest for the few moments it existed before she absorbed it into her armor. At first she struggled to cope with possessing three Teigus at once, a seemingly impossible feat only accomplished once before by Jacqueline at the climax of the Siege of the Imperial Capital, so much so that she collapsed to one knee from the strain.

After grunting for at least a minute she opened her eyes wide and cried out in a mixture of pain and determination, the resulting release causing two slits to appear in the back of her armor and unveil something wondrous. Her sister's flaming phoenix wings were now protruding from her back, marking the fusion between Tyrannus and Gungnir a complete a success and granting her access to all of the Teigu's techniques and latent abilities.

Lucena looked over her shoulder at the wings and she couldn't stop herself from crying at the sight of the beautiful blue flames they emitted. There was no doubt that somewhere Selena was smiling at her, and with that in mind she dispersed the newly upgraded Tyrannus and wiped her eyes clean, a grin on her face.

" _Let's go Sis._ "

Later, Arthur felt Lucena coming toward him and turned to face the approaching Great General, her sister Juno, Morgan, and Leonard following suite to greet her when she arrived at the wall.

"Did you find what you were looking for?" asked the Emperor.

Lucena nod her head and smiled while adjusting the key for Tyrannus in its sheath. "Yeah. I'm ready to go when you guys are."

Arthur returned the nod and then, once created by Lucena, mounted an ice dragon and grabbed hold of the reins to lead them to where their next adventure lied waiting for them. Even his own sense of adventure and danger started to make his blood boil in anticipation for a fight with Mephistopheles, and he couldn't help but grin, an expression he hadn't been able to do for a very, very long time.

"It is time we bring an end to this madness! Let us be off!"

 **\- The Bastion -**

"There is no doubt about it...they will come to the Bastion seeking repentance from me."

"What are you going to do?" asked Hikari of Mephisto as they watched from the fortress gate the revived Four Horsemen spread out and disappear into the snowstorm.

They had returned to the fortress a day before after they had recovered their bodies and managed to swim out of the deepest part of the ocean between Straelka and the Empire, their immortal bodies withstanding everything nature threw at them thanks to Mephisto's venom.

"I understand their views and feelings about me and what I've done, but I must still make an attempt to explain myself. It's the only thing I can do." replied Mephisto without turning to look at Hikari.

"But what if they don't listen to you? What will you do then?"

Mephisto lowered his gaze and sighed heavily, his shoulders turning slightly so Hikari could see the sorrowful look painted on his face because of the situation.

"Then I will have no choice but to fight and defeat them. Maybe then they will come to grasp my intentions."

After their short talk, HIkari returned to the inner bowels of the fortress and came to an empty bedroom that was once shared by Mephisto and Noctis. Now, it was occupied by the mentally comatose friends and family of hers that he hypnotized and brought there.

Her heart clenched up when she saw Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya sitting on the ground with their backs against the wall, their glassy stares devoid of any emotion. Hikari felt back for Leone, Lubbock, Fiona and Rafe as well, but she hurt more for her own two parents that were directly in front of her.

If there was ever a time where she doubted her choices, this was when the young girl was at odds with herself the most.

"Mom, Dad...y-you probably can't hear me, b-but…" stuttered Hikari, her bottled up emotions breaking free once again. "I'm s-sorry, so, so, *so sorry...I brought you into this mess with everyone else. We were happy, all of us, and then I had to go and cafuck it all up...I don't know what to do any more!"

Hikari collapsed to her knees and began to cry and wail with such intensity her shrieks of sorrow could be heard without the Bastion. Mephisto even heard her and had to close his eyes and tried to block her out since he too would begin to doubt his actions if he listened. His mind wondered, however, despite his body's wishes and immediately went to Noctis, wherever she was, and he placed a hand to his beating heart and shuddered.

'" _Noctis...my love...am I doing what is right? Am I right in your eyes?_ "

 **\- 2 Days Later -**

"Somewhere in there is the Bastion. Even from here...I can sense a vile aura that make me feel uneasy." said Arthur with a frown, his companions agreeing silently.

They stood at the crest of a sandy dune that marked the border of the Southern Territories and the Far South, a wild, untamed land that they couldn't even see due to the vicious snowstorm that raged on before them. The harsh, icy winds could be felt by the group even from where they stood a mile away from the storm's edge, its intensity on a whole other scale.

"To think a single human being could produce such a force of nature…" murmured Leonard in awe.

"Indeed. We are definitely dealing with something that outclasses any previous enemy we've encountered." stated Arthur as he crossed his arms.

"I'm not gonna let anything stand in my way. This's snowstorm isn't nothing compared to the North." remarked Lucena with a smirk before she began to descend the sand the dune, Arthur, Juno, Leonard and Morgan following close behind.

The closer they got to the snowstorm, the quicker they realized that it was much bigger then they could have possibly imagined, and that Lucena realized that the snowstorm was in fact *worse then what she experienced in the north. Arthur came prepared, thankfully, by unloading several heavy coats from a pack he had slung over his shoulder and giving them to Morgan, Lucena and Morgan.

Once they were bundled up and ready to go, before Lucena could take one step into the storm they were frozen in place by the deafening roar of something not of this world. They easily knew what the roar belonged to, and they all drew their weapons for when they encounter either one or all of the Four Horsemen within the blizzard.

With their wits set about them, they entered the white of the snowstorm and disappeared within its snowy whirlwinds.

Onward they trekked through the blistering cold, the sub-arctic conditions of the snowstorm's interior making it difficult to move efficiently for everyone but Arthur, since he cold hardly affected him at all. Frost had already formed on their clothes and Lucena had to periodically break off icicles that formed on underside of her cap's bill. She couldn't stop shivering either, and a single glance at Juno, Morgan and Leonard told her they were in the same boat as her.

Leonard was better off then any them since he wore a helmet and a thick, insulated wool body suit underneath his regular clothes, but since it was suited more for fire resistance...the frigid air still reached him through it all the way to his bones.

It was utterly miserable trudging through the knee-deep snow, but despite all of the troubles plaguing them, they were all thankful for Arthur being there in the thick of it.

Even though the Emperor couldn't feel the cold weather like they could, he still walked on alongside them, leading them through the wind and ice and snow toward the Bastion.

" _No wonder he was such a loved leader during his life as a human. Being here with those he considered his friends, anyone would put their trust and faith in a person like that._ " Lucena thought as she watched Arthur's back through the blinding wind.

Suddenly she sensed the presence of four enormously powerful auras around them, a split-second reaction allowing her to cloak herself in Tyrannus and manifest a multi-layered ice dome around herself and the others.

Three consecutive bolts of lightning and a large fire blast struck the dome, turning the inside into a mesmerizing light show for the few seconds the attack lasted.

"Lucena, are those-" Juno started to ask when she saw her sister's new form in Tyrannus.

"We can talk later, right now we have a fight on our hands." said Lucena, shutting down Juno's question while she lowered the ice dome.

Looking down on them from all sides were the Four Horsemen, the Danger Beasts emitting such a violent and powerful aura it sent shivers running up and down their spines.

"I'll take care of Wintorra. I have an idea, and if it works, follow my lead!" said Lucena before she flapped her phoenix wings and took off for Wintorra.

The ice dragon reared up on her hind legs and swiped at Lucena while her right head sprayed a stream of ice to try and knock Lucena out of the air. The Great General responded by ducking and avoiding the consecutive attacks and sucked in a deep breath, all of her hopes for a quick fight getting placed on what she said next.

"Wintorra! Stop what you're doing!" she bellowed a the top of her lungs.

To everyone's surprise, Wintorra actually froze for a moment as if to contemplate the name, like it was familiar to her. Lucena took advantage of the hesitation and snapped her fingers, a massive column of ice coming into existence behind her.

"Massen Hagelsprung!" she said, the large ice construct brushing past her on its descent toward Wintorra.

The technique struck her dead on and crushed her beneath its immense weight, a plume of snow shooting outward from the circumference of the ice as soon as it met ground. A few seconds later and Wintorra burst out of the ice, heavily injured with a broken leg and split skull, the Danger Beast shuffling away and roaring at Lucena in a mixture of pain and anger.

" _I see now, they still remember their names! If we're able to remind them of who they once were, they'll try to fight against the venom and we can defeat them!_ " thought Arthur before he set his eyes on Gigardos and grasped his sword with both hands.

When Lucius cawed and took to the skies with lightning trailing behind its feathers, Arthur uttered his chant and quickly took on his Trump Card form, his angel wings glowing brightly through the snowy wind as he gave chase after the thunderbird.

"Lucius, leader of the Four Horsemen, hear me now! My name is Arthur Pendragon, founder and current Emperor of the mighty Empire, child of Avalon, descendant of the Kingdom of Avalonnis! Lucius, I am of your kin, of your blood!" announced Arthur to the thunderbird with pride, Lucius coming to a halt and staring at him.

Even if it was just for a second, Arthur could see a hint of recognition from the eyes of hiss ancestor, which meant hiss words had gotten through to him. Even Azura, who had heated his proclamation on the ground during her duel with Morgan, hesitated when she too recalled her past life as the bearer of her lover's legacy.

"Yes, remember who you all are! Kanon, I know you're in there somewhere! You're Azura's closest companion, a brother to her!" exclaimed Juno after rolling to the side to avoid one of Kanon's tusks, which caused the same effect for him.

All of the Four Horsemen recognized their names and reacted the same way, pausing for a moment to think about it and remember a part of their past lives before the venom took back control. Juno used Imperator's monstrous strength to hammer away at Kanon, breaking through his apparently impenetrable defenses to reach his weak spots, while she continued to speak of Kanon the entire time.

Morgan used the flight advantage his Teigu gave him over Azura and avoided all of her fire attacks, his words the strongest weapon in his arsenal that brought her closer and closer to remembering herself.

"Come on Wintorra, fight it! Listen to my voice and become the person you once were!" pleaded Lucena, her verbal cries hurting Wintorra more then her ice techniques and ice fire she inherited from Gungnir.

She could see the Wintorra that once was fighting with the venom inside. Her movements were becoming slower, more erratic, like there was an internal struggle over who gets to control the body. Lucena was almost there, and there was on last trick up her sleeve that will finally bring an end to their quarrel once and for all.

She ripped from her helmet, cupped her mouth, and yelled, "I don't want to fight you, Wintorra! You're my family!"

The eyes of one of Wintorra's three heads widened, its reaction to Lucena's proclamation a stark contrast to other two and their obvious animalistic rage. When she thought that there was no use, she was blown away when that head roared and bit down hard on the neck of the middle head, only letting go after thrashing it around and breaking its spinal cord in several places. Then, before the third head could react, Wintorra froze it in a thick block of ice that caused it to fall to the ground and shatter into millions of tiny fragments of frozen flesh and ice.

With them gone, the only remaining head turned to look at Lucena and calmly nod once, telling her that for the moment she was in full control of herself for the first time in many, many years.

"Okay." said Lucena with a smile as she touched down on the snow and pressed both hands against the top layer. "Grauhorn."

Only a grunt escaped the lips of Wintorra when a razor sharp ice horn pierced her through the gut and out her back. She slumped on the ice and her head hit the snow with a thump, the light in her eyes fading away in a matter of seconds to mark her death. What happened next could only be described as a miracle straight out of a child's story book.

Lucena was astounded when from the mouth of the only surviving head of Skessa, the Danger Beast Wintorra was transformed into, emerged the female ice-user herself totally unscathed with the appearance she had in her youth at the time the Four Horsemen were first made.

"So...you're a descendent of mine, hm?" she asked with a grin as she approached Lucena and hugged her affectionately, Wintorra's warmth reaching her through her armor and negating the effects of the snowstorm.

"Thank you for saving me Lucena, even though it won't last for long." said Wintorra, Lucena's happy expression turning to confusion.

"What do you mean?"

"It's taking almost all of my strength to hold back the venom and maintain this form, there's nothing that can fully get rid of its hold on our bodies." explained her ancestor before she gazed at her compatriots fighting Lucena's friends and sighed, a bow of solid ice coming into existence within her fingers. "With what little time I have, I will assist you."

She drew back her arm, which simultaneously created three separate ice arrows tipped with beautifully crafted yet razor sharp arrow tips, and aimed at Lucius, Azura and Kanon. Her entire body relaxed and with a single, controlled breath she let the arrows fly towards their targets.

Wintorra used her ice-manipulation ability carried the arrows right to the hearts of her friends, and when they pierced flesh she clenched her fist and caused the arrow tips to explode into multiple ice shards that skewered the other Horsemen. Blood spewed out of their backs and the wounds they sustained from the attacks, the sudden injuries catching their opponents, Juno, Morgan and Arthur, completely off guard.

"Lucena, was that you?" asked Juno with a glance at her sister, but her question was answered as soon as she spotted Wintorra standing right next to her with the bow of ice at her side.

"No way!"

Juno, Morgan and Arthur quickly went to Lucena's side, the Great General taking the time to introduce Wintorra to them all while she greeted them all with a handshake and a warm smile.

"It's all nice to meet you, but first, I need to meet my friends." said Wintorra before she walked past them and approached a group of three moving toward them somewhat awkwardly, like they had just woken up from a long slumber.

"Ugh...did you really have to hurt us that bad Wintorra? I feel like I had my guts ripped out all at once…" muttered Azura as she gripped her stomach, her complaint bringing a chuckle from Lucius and Kanon.

"Sorry about that. Butt that's beside the poi9nt, there are some who want to speak with us." replied Wintorra with an apologetic expression.

She stepped aside so the could see Lucena, Juno, Arthur, Morgan and Leonard staring at them in complete awe. Wintorra couldn't blame them since they were practically legends that had just come to life before their very eyes.

While Juno introduced herself to Wintorra as she continued talking with Lucena, and Leonard and Morgan struck up a conversation with Kanon, Arthur was immediately approached by Lucius and Azura who were interested in meeting with him.

"Great Grandfather, Great Grandmother." he addressed them formerly, taking a knee before them out of respect.

"Rise, Arthur Pendragon, there is no need to bow your head to me. If anything, *I should be the one kneeling to you, *Emperor." stated Lucius when he held his descendants shoulders and lifted him back to his feet.

"Tell us what's happened with our lineage! We want to know what you've experienced!" asked Azura excitedly, her bubbly and child-like personality making Arthur wonder how in the world he was descended from her.

He chuckled to himself and gave them a shortened version of his story dating from current times to as far back as he could remember. They were highly pleased and excited for a lot of the happy times he retold, but when he arrived at the time of the corrupt Prime Minister and the Revolution, they were appalled at how a human being could be so heartless and evil.

"That's awful...but I'm glad things were able to turn out okay in the end. If only our descendant during that time hadn't been so easily swayed by that man…" said Lucius with a sigh, Arthur nodding his head solemnly and agreeing with him.

Everyone would have wanted too speak with each other for a little while longer, to learn more about the lives of their predecessors, but when Wintorra winced and placed a hand over her heart, she and the other Horsemen figured out their time as themselves was coming to an end.

However, they held no desire to return to being the vile Danger Beasts in service to Mephisto and his commands.

"It's our time to go now, Lucena. It was nice meeting you and your sister as well as your friends." said Wintorra as she hugged them one last time before she walked away to stand with her companions.

They had no idea what to expect from the four until Wintorra raised a single hand to the sky and closed her eyes, her middle finger and thumb touching tips for a fraction of a second.

"Release." she whispered with a finger snap, a tiny little blue light appearing in the sky above her that lasted long enough to produce nothing short of an act of god.

Lucena, who was a master of Demon's Extract, was utterly humbled by the raw power of the original user when Wintorra dispersed the snowstorm that had been raging across the Far South for hundreds of thousands of years in the blink of an eye. The wind died down and the snow stopped falling, the only remainder of what used to be the monstrous blizzard being the grey clouds hanging overhead.

"Whoa…" uttered Juno in awe.

"Goodbye, everyone! See you on the other side!" exclaimed Lucius with a goodbye wave to them before he motioned to Azura with a smile, his lover returning the gesture and clasping her hands together.

Then, without warning, she, Lucius, Kanon and Wintorra as well as the corpse of their Danger Beast counterparts were abruptly engulfed in flames produced by the fire-user herself. Lucena and the others were speechless, unsure of what to think, but they soon realized what the Four Horsemen were thinking of when they saw Lucius and Azura embrace one another and close their eyes, accepting their fate.

Wintorra waved one last time at Lucena and Juno before her body turned to ash, followed by Kanon, then Lucius and Azura at the same time. To ensure they would never be used again to commit acts of evil, and that they would no longer had to suffer through walking the Earth, never to die, they burned their bodies so that nothing, not even the venom, would be left behind.

Their Danger Beast corpses turned to ash as well, and with a slight breeze like a breath of relief, the ash they produced was blown away across the land to places unknown.

Lucena, Juno, Arthur, Morgan and Leonard waited a few moments to pay their final respects to the four legendary heroes and the lives they lived before their untimely fates, before finally turning and continuing through the snow-laden earth toward their final destination.

 **\- The Bastion -**

Mephisto was in the process of sharpening his old war blade, a large grayish-black cleaver sword that was as big as him in size, when he raised his head up and looked to the sky through the hole in the throne room ceiling.

" _So I'm all that's left…_ " he thought before Hikari came running into the throne room, an astounded look on her face.

"Mephisto, you're not gonna believe this, the snowstorm, it-"

"Yes, I know. The snowstorm has indeed vanished...which can only mean one thing." said Mephisto while turning his head to glance back at her over his shoulder. "The Four Horsemen are gone...I am the only one who's left now."

The Danger Beast picked up his cleaver sword and stood up, his gaze now resting fully on the young woman since he had her full attention. He approached Hikari and placed a hand on her shoulder, locked his eyes with hers, and bowed hiss head ever so slightly.

"Hikari, if you do not want to fight, I won't hold it against you. I understand you don't want to fight your loved ones, I know that just as well as you do."

"Thank you, Mephisto, but I stand by my decision. You're the only one capable enough to do it." replied Hikari with a smile before she hugged the Danger Beast, Mephisto smiling as he returned the hug.

" _Come and get me._ "


	71. All of my Sins

A/N This is it, the start of the (second) climax everyone. We've come a long way to get here, so let's power on through and get to the end! Leave a fav and review.

* * *

 **Chapter 70 - All of my Sins**

After an hour of silence, Lucena crested a rocky hill set above the snow and narrowed her eyes, her hands balling up into fists. Juno and Arthur came up second, followed by Morgan and Leonard, and they all stared out over the depression the hill caved down into toward the lone structure resting at its center. It was the Bastion, the icicles draping its exterior architecture and the several broken walls sections and collapsed buildings spread out through the compound showing to age.

It was an ancient fortress occupied by an equally ancient evil, and somewhere inside that compound were their families and friends. That fact alone made Morgan and Leonard's blood boil, while Lucena and Juno remained unphased externally. On the inside, however, Lucena was still fighting with herself ver re attitude and feelings toward Hikari and the letter she had received from her.

Thankfully she was able take her mind off of her when they noticed two figure emerge from the Bastion and come to a stop a few yards away from the main gate. Unfortunately the break on thinking about Hikari, even though they were far away and unrecognizable, came to an end since she knew just who those two figures were.

"Arthur, could you get into the fortress through another entrance and find everyone? I want them away from here." asked Juno nicely, the Emperor replying by sliding back down the hill to circle around the fortress out of sight.

With him gone, Lucena led her friends into the depression, which lacked snow unlike the rest of the tundra, toward the Bastion and the two figures. When they got closer, like they suspected, they hid their emotions behind masks of disinterest because one of the figures was Hikari, who stood there rigidly with the sheathed Murasame at her hip.

The other person was undoubtedly Mephistopheles, his dark colored armor, large cleaver sword, and overall devilish appearance matching Taiyang's description perfectly.

When they came to within a couple of feet off the Danger Beast, Hikari averted her gaze from Lucena yet remained strong in body despite the resentment she could feel oozing from Leonard.

"Greetings, everyone. Welcome to my home." said Mephisto warmly.

"Cut the crap, Mephisto, you can't fool us. We were told about who you are, and we're here to kill you." growled Leonard as he gripped Enkidu tightly, his killer intent producing no noticeable reaction from the Danger Beast.

" _So he really did talk to them...dammit, that's going to make this difficult._ "

"I see...well, I'm willing to accept any challenge you pose to me. However, if you'll allow me, I'd like to pose a question to you." asked Mephisto without a break in his friendly composure.

"What question could you possibly ask is that would matter?" challenged Morgan with a growl.

Mephisto's eyes narrowed and he pointed right at them, the warm and friendly aura he was giving off morphing into a foreboding one that sent chills running down their spines. "What if I told you that you had been lied to?"

His question froze everyone to their spots, especially Lucena since she had heard a similar statement come from Hikari earlier on when she had first met Taiyang. When he felt that it had sunk in, Mephisto cleared his throat and crossed his arms across his chest, ready to state his claim.

"Tell me, why are you here right now? What is your goal?" he asked of no one in particular.

"To save our family and friends while he beat the utter shit out of you, that's why." snarled Leonard in response. "You wanted to enslave humanity and waged war against your own kind, even going so far as to kill your former lover. You're a monster that deserves to die."

Hikari glanced at Mephisto for any emotional signs from his eyes, a skill she had gotten quite good at since he hardly ever took his helmet off, and sighed in relief under her breath when she hardly noticed a change.

"And that is what you heard from Taiyang Xiao Long...correct?" questioned Mephisto further.

The group of four were at a total loss behind the facade of their emotionless expressions, the revelation that their foe had perfect knowledge about Taiyang and that he had talked to them catching them off guard. They didn't really have a way to respond, but just their silence alone was enough to give Mephisto the answer he was looking for.

"I see...but why do you trust Taiyang? We are one and the same, ancient Danger Beasts who lived during that time. You won't trust the words of someone like me, or Rex Tyrannos, or even Garmr to a certain extent, but you do trust Taiyang."

"Because he was the one that gave the Four Horsemen the tools needed to defeat you! To prevent any more innocent lives from being taken!" exclaimed Lucena.

Mephisto shook his head and tapped his foot on the ground a few times, his reaction curbing some of her anger a little bit. "Indeed...but not for the reasons that you just stated."

"What are you talking about? What sort of reasons could he possibly have to bring an end to the war by killing you?" asked Juno, who was aiming to get as much information out of the Danger Beast as she could before Leonard had enough.

"For that exact reason _and_ more. Before the Great War, Taiyang was the Danger Beast everyone feared and respected, his power and strength knowing no bounds. He is as old as he is wise, the _very_ first Danger Beast to be born into this world...and with his power and intelligence he was revered as a god by the earliest generations of Humans." explained Mephisto before he crossed his arms and referred to himself with a finger. "He looked over the world, caring for, nurturing it, and ensuring that nothing could corrupt its natural beauty and wildlife. As such...he took certain _measures_ to ensure that nothing could change it."

Mephisto's own anger reared its head as his fists clenched tightly and he growled under his breath, Hikari remaining silent during his rant while Lucena, Juno, Morgan and Leonard continued to listen. This was a part of history none of them had ever heard of before, but deep down Leonard was getting tired of hearing the person, no, _thing_ that destroyed his home and kidnapped his family talk to them.

"When more powerful Danger Beasts like myself began to appear, Rex Tyrannos, Garmr, my beloved Noctis, he did not view us as friends...he viewed us as potential threats to his "order"." snarled Mephisto, his rage-filled eyes locking with Lucena's as he pointed over her shoulder in the direction of Taiyang's library. "That bastard is the one you should be trying to kill, not me."

"Are you insane?! Why would we kill the one that helped save Humanity from you?!" yelled Morgan.

"Taiyang Xiao Long, to ensure that we would be dealt with accordingly in a manner that would leave no evidence of his involvement, instrumented the Great War, which would lead to the deaths of those he considered to be the greatest of threats. Myself, Noctis, all of them...we were the targets all along. If only I had noticed sooner, I could have-"

Suddenly Leonard lashed out with Enkidu's dagger tip, the chain hurdling toward Mephisto at lightning-quick speeds and coming very close to hitting him if not for Hikari using the sheath Murasame to stop the attack. She stared down Leonard, seemingly ready to fight him if he showed any more aggression, but when Mephisto placed a hand on her shoulder she relaxed.

"Very well, if that is how you all feel, then I have no choice but to defeat you."

"I'll help-" Hikari started to say before Mephisto stepped in front of her and glared at her with such intensity it paralyzed her.

" _No_ , I absolutely refuse. I shall not allow you to travel down the same path as I...to fight against and risk ending the life of the one you love." said Mephisto sternly while his gaze moved from her to Lucena. "I will engage them in battle _alone_."

Hikari begrudgingly returned Murasame to her side and stepped away from Mephisto, her movement bringing an unseen wave of relief to both her and Lucena since there was no zero chance of them hurting one another...at least, for now. Lucena was so grateful she actually found herself thanking the Danger Beast within her thoughts, which came as a surprise.

" _Don't think about that right now, just focus on what's in front of you._ " she told herself when the nigh impregnable Tyrannus took form around her, it's newly acquired Phoenix wings casting their glow on Mephisto's armor.

"I do not want to fight you all, but if the only way to get you to listen is by defeating you, then I shall gladly take it." he said as he hefted his cleaver sword up into his shoulder and waited patiently, his eyes darting from one person to the other.

"I'll finish this here and now." growled Leonard as he took of the glove covering Kami and raised his hand up, the ring glowing slightly.

" _Oh we'll have none of that. I remember that from Garmr's fight._ " thought Mephisto when he sprung into action, his body flickering for but a moment before the flat face of his sword was rammed deep into Leonard's gut.

He was sent flying back by the force of the blow, and Lucena, Juno and Morgan were stunned for a moment by Mephisto's inhuman speed. Lucena reacted first and summoned Neuntote to her grasp, the spear now a hybrid between its previous state and Gungnir, and lunged at Mephisto. He pushed the blade away with his hand and followed up with a devastating blow with his sword on the weapon, which broke it in two and robbed Lucena of it.

"You think I need that to fight?" asked Lucena smugly as she clapped her hands together and summoned a cloud of icicles behind her. "Weissschnabel!"

Mephisto backflipped to avoid a majority of the ice shards and then used his sword as a shield to block the rest of them from hitting him. He peeked over the sword for a fraction of a second and gasped when several horns of ice emerged from the ground directly underneath his feet. One came dangerously close to impaling him, but he was lucky to have reacted just in the nick of time and used his sword as a launchpad to propel himself into the air with the help of the ice horns.

"Don't forget about me!"

Mephisto didn't have any time to react to Juno's devastating Guillotine Droop, the heel of her foot shattering his armor and spine in one blow. He rocketed back toward earth and crashed through the frozen ground, the impact creating a plume of icy smoke and dust to expand and cover the surrounding area.

Wanting to ensure that he would stay down, Lucena brought her hands up to her tattoo and gathered her energy, the familiar blue sphere appearing from thin air just above it.

"Mahapadma." she uttered, the time-stopping Trump Card coming into effect and freezing everything around her.

Unlike her mother, she had even better control over Demon's Extract and thus could have Mahapadma last for a longer duration of time, so she took he time in approaching Mephisto's impact crater. Lucena peered down at the broken Danger Beast and scowled as she stomped her foot at the crater's edge, manifesting a spiderweb of icicles that turned Mephisto into swiss cheese.

She returned to Juno's side just when the effects of Mahapadma wore off and grinned, the grunts of pain from Mephisto's hole reaching her ears a split second later.

"What happened?" asked Morgan, confused.

"You used your Trump Card, didn't you?" said Juno with a nudge t Lucena, who chuckled and nod her head.

Their moment of relief came to an abrupt end when a second snowy explosion emerged from Mephisto's crater, followed by the Danger Beast himself climbing up out of the carnage with sword in hand. His wounds magically healed before their very eyes, and surprisingly his armor also repaired itself in the areas that were penetrated by Lucena's ice.

They were given a grim reminder about the fact that his heart was Devil's Heart, so they bore down on their fears and prepared to fight Mephisto again.

"If death is the punishment I shall receive for all of my sins, then I shall gladly take it." said Mephisto before he pointed his sword at them. "But before I fall, I must ensure that you live."

With his statement serving only to confuse them, Mephisto vanished in the blink of an eye and reappeared right next to Leonard, who had just managed to recover from his previous hit. Mephisto threw his fist into Leonard's gut, and when he doubled over in pain the Danger Beast clocked him in the jaw with his knee and knocked him out cold.

" _One down...three to go._ "

 **\- Taiyang's Library -**

Tyrant looked at Alzora with a reassuring smile as she lowered them down on an ice platform toward Taiyang's grotto, the darkened stone walls of the hole it was built in giving them an uneasy feeling.

"It's gonna be fine. Taiyang is understanding, he'll listen to what we have to say. I'm just hoping we'll get an answer that'll clear up these doubts of mine." he murmured, Alzora nodding her head in agreement.

They touched ground and Tyrant stepped off the disk first, offering a hand to Alzora while grinning so that he could help her down. She blushed at his courtesy and took his hand, making the tiny step of the ice and dispersing it before they both turned too look into the black abyss of Taiyang's cave. The ancient Danger Beast's presence could clearly be sensed through the blackness, and that alone was enough for them to relax a little.

" _Just wait outside for him to appear, once he senses you he'll walk outside. Good luck._ " Tyrant remembered Kaminari telling them before leaving the tower too conduct some errands, which left them alone in the library with Taiyang and his helpers.

"Do you think he'll really understand?" asked Alzora in a whisper, afraid that Taiyang would overhear them.

"I'm sure of it. Don't worry, Snowflake." replied Tyrant with his cocky grin.

Alzora's cheeks turned as red as her eyes in response to the nickname and she punched him lightly in the arm, saying, "I-I told you not to call me that!"

"But it's hilarious to see your reaction."

She got even more flustered and Tyrant started to laugh, but their fun times were halted with Taiyang made his appearance. The two Danger Beasts quickly composed themselves now that their elder was in their presence and respectfully bowed, Taiyang responding the same way.

"Greetings, young ones. What brings you here to me?"

"Taiyang, we've been thinking about some stuff here recently, and we wanted to talk to you about it." said Tyrant, which caught Taiyang's interest immediately.

"Oh? And what would that be?"

"It's about Mephistopheles. To be perfectly honest, considering these recent events, we're not so sure about him any more." spoke up Alzora, her hands coming together as if she were pleading. "If he really despised Humanity and wanted to enslave them, why did he have his subordinates, aside from Garmr, watch over the cities they besieged and not totally destroy them?"

Taiyang propped himself on his elbows and cocked his head slightly to the right, thinking about the question for a few moments and recalling his nigh-infinite knowledge to determine an answer.

"Well, there could be many reasons why. The most obvious could be a trap, as you know, since pretending to act differently is one of the easiest tactics a person could use to deceive an opponent." he said in response.

"That's what we thought as well, and its still a viable conclusion. But...maybe there's another reason, something else at play. We don't know ourselves, which is why we came to you." said Tyrant after shoving his hands into his pockets.

Taiyang sighed heavily as he picked his body up off the ground and fixed his gaze on the two Danger Beasts, who waited patiently to hear what wise words he had to say.

"I see. Then allow me to assist you in your endeavor, Tyrant and Alzora."

 **\- The Bastion -**

Lucena cursed under her breath at the perilous situation she wa in at the moment, her hand's grip around her ice sword tightening. Leonard and Morgan had both been knocked out cold by Mephisto, and Juno, despite being protected by Imperator, had been beaten into submission and left on the ground nearby with Imperator's key next to her.

Lucena was the only one left still standing, and despite all of her efforts that didn't include leveling the entire area with her second Trump Card, Mephisto still stood there opposing her without a single injury.

" _Dammit, what do I do, what do I do?_ " she thought to herself as Mephisto drew closer to her.

Hikari on the other hand watched silently from the gates of the Bastion, unsure of what to do. Mephisto was fighting to keep his dream alive, and Lucena, the one she loved most in the world outside her parents, was fighting for what she believed was right.

" _Make a choice Hikari! Come on!_ " her heart and mind screamed at her, yet her bed remained locked in place.

Before she could do anything, however, the clouds above them darkened and flashed several times as lightning came to life within them. Suddenly a thunderous boom echoed out across the landscape and a massive lightning bolt came crashing down a few yards in front of Lucena, the bolt vanishing and leaving behind an unrecognizable figure.

Once the dust and snow from bolt's impact dissipated, Lucena gasped when the figure turned out to be an almost alien-like person with long, unruly yellow-white hair and a muscular build, making the figure a male. He wore white armor and body suit with a collar and ballooning pants, clawed boots, and a feature in the armor that made her shudder. All armored sections featured fully functioning red eyes with slit pupils that did not blink, a disturbing aspect that gave the man that alien-like persona. Finally, to complete the look, the man wore a featureless two-horned helmet, giving him the appearance of a futuristic samurai alien.

What finally told her his identity was the calm, yet superior aura the man gave off. But she knew just from the extraordinarily long katana he held in his grasp that he wasn't here to talk.

"So, you've finally decided to make your debut….Taiyang Xiao Long." said Mephisto with a growl as he stared at the newcomer, Taiyang merely brushing off the hidden threat and sighing regretfully.

"Yes, I have, Mephistopheles. I regret not taking action sooner, for my neutrality has led to the deaths of those who did not deserve to die. After speaking with two other Danger Beasts who are friends of young Lucena, I made the decision to come here personally." replied Taiyang calmly, his whole attitude and posture reflecting his status.

"And I assume this is one of the many forms you can take in order to hide yourself among humans? questioned Mephisto when the two Danger Beasts began to circle one another, his cleaver sword aimed at Taiyang.

"This is merely a form that I conjured up in order to engage you in combat, you vile rogue." replied Taiyang before turning to glance back at Lucena and motioning toward her friends. "Ensure your friends are okay and protect them. I also sense that your ally is making his way back here with your loved ones. I will deal with Mephistopheles _myself_ , and from there I will help you in rebuilding."

"Do not listen to his lies! He is a deceiver, and I shall prove it to you all by defeating him right here, right now!" bellowed Mephisto, his outburst making Hikari and Lucena jump.

"Silence, Mephistopheles, God of Chaos. It's time for your existence to come to an end. _Permanently_."

With that proclamation Taiyang finally drew his blade and tossed away the sheath, his sword crackling and glowing when he channeled his lightning through it. The two Danger Beasts stared at one another for half a second before they vanished in the blink of an eye, the only clue to their existence being the thunderous shockwaves they produced after every sword clash.

Lucena now knew that she wasn't in the presence of mere Danger Beasts, she was way out of her league now. She was in the presence of gods among men.


	72. Pellem auream, ad cor tenebrosum

A/N This is the chapter that I've been waiting or quite a while now, but its the one that comes after this one that'll be my all time favorite too write. I can't wait t get started on it, but for now, let's focus on the here and now. Some of you might already have seen it coming, but whatever! On with the story! And also, I will get around to updating the wiki about all off the new crud that's gone on, I apologize for not being up to date with it but I'm not finding any time at all to get it done. I promise that I'll hopefully get it done, but until then, leave a fav and review!

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 **Chapter 71 - Pellem auream, ad cor tenebrosum**

"Ugh...what's going on?" muttered Morgan when he came to, the resounding thunderclaps in the air assaulting his eardrums.

"It's Taiyang, he's fighting Mephistopheles." replied Lucena to her friend as she strained her eyes to try and catch a glimpse of the two lightning-fast Danger Beasts.

She was sitting with Juno, Morgan and the still unconscious Leonard off on the sidelines away from the Bastion so Taiyang would have room to engage Mephisto without worry of harming them.

Behind them was Arthur, who like Taiyang and said appeared a few minutes earlier with their family and loved ones in tow. Unfortunately, they were still trapped in their hypnotized states and only had enough mental cognition to walk on their own with the Emperor guiding them. Hikari had also retreated from the Bastion, but stood separated from their group by several meters, her gaze staying away from theirs since she still felt guilty.

Lucena wanted to talk to her, but she was too enthralled by the nigh-invisible fight taking place between Taiyang and Mephisto.

"To think our ancestors fought against Danger Beasts like them...they're like gods…" murmured Juno when the thunder suddenly stopped abruptly, Taiyang and Mephisto coming back into existence a second later.

They were completely unharmed, and there were no signs of exhaustion present in their postures even after that short display of inhuman agility and strength. The fight had only just begun for the two, the power they showcased the tip f the iceberg for their vast wells of energy.

"I never would've expected you to have such skill in the art of swordplay, it makes me believe you were the one who threatened my life." said Mephisto when they began to circle one another again.

"I am the keeper of all knowledge, my mind a nigh-endless vault of information. Many a scroll or book containing sword techniques have passed through my library, and its only natural for me to memorize them." responded Taiyang when he twirled his katana around a few times.

The discussion came to an end when Mephisto rushed Taiyang again and swung hi cleaver sword, the dragon ducking under the blade and ramming his elbow into Mephisto's gut. The blow hardly phased him and Mephisto pressed his assault, his cleaver sword drawing dangerously close to Taiyang time and time again as he pushed him toward the Bastion's front gate.

"I will not allow you to win!" roared Mephisto before he reared back and slammed his fist into Taiyang's jaw, launching him through the gate and deep into the fortress.

When he struck the unseeable object inside and huge plume of smoke washed out from the opening, blowing past Mephisto and fading away. A few moments of silence drifted past like the smoke being blown away in the wind until, all of a sudden, a booming thunderclap resonated from the clouds above. A storm of lightning bolts came crashing down onto the Bastion and completely annihilated the front half off the fortress, clearing the way for Taiyang to emerge from the rubble and hover in midair, lightning surrounding him on all sides.

He then thrust his arm forward at Mephisto, saying, "Tiāntáng zhī léi."

Mephisto quickly raised his sword up over his head to hide under its wide blade when three consecutive bolts of lightning, each one stronger then its predecessor, struck him directly with enough voltage to turn a normal human being to dust.

"Is that all you've-" Mephisto started to say before Taiyang, cloaked in lightning, appeared right in front of him.

"Tiāntáng zhī shǎn." he murmured, his katana exploding with electricity as he slashed through Mephisto's gut faster then light itself.

Mephisto coughed and stumbled backward, the steaming pitch-black gash in his stomach broadcasting paralyzing waves of pain through his nervous system. When he looked down, expecting his blood to start to heal the wound, he was shocked too see nothing of the sorts occurring.

" _What trickery is this?! Why can't I heal?!_ "

"My divine lightning is no mere force of nature. Your blood cannot so easily heal the damage inflicted by it." explained Taiyang calmly, no longer contained in a sphere of lightning. "With that being said...the world no longer needs the likes of you."

Mephisto's eyes widened when his words rang a bell in the back of his mind, but before he could act, Taiyang made his move. One slash cut open his chest from his left shoulder to his right hip, a second disarmed the Danger Beast of his sword and his right arm, and a third brought him to his knees when Taiyang's katana swung clean through his kneecaps.

"He did it, Taiyang won!" exclaimed Juno happily, Lucena grinning ear to ear.

Arthur turned around when he heard a gasp come from behind laughed when the hypnotic trance holding Tatsumi, Esdeath, Maya and the others captive vanished.

"What happened? And where are we?" asked Tatsumi for them before he recognized Arthur and saw the drastic change in his appearance. "Arthur?! How did you become more...human?"

"That can be explained later, my friend. For now, rejoice, Mephisto's been defeated by Taiyang." said Arthur with a grin.

Esdeath and Maya noticed their daughters when they looked past Arthur and called to them, Lucena turning at the voice of her other and very nearly coming to tears out of joy in seeing her mother again. Juno, Morgan, and Leonard, now awake, followed suite after the Great General when she ran to her family's loving embrace while greeting their friends at the same time.

Wave and Akame spotted Hikari and were about to make the walk over to her to console and bring her back if not for the vicious cough from Mephisto interrupting everyone's happy moment.

Once his coughing fit had ended, the snake Danger Beast stared angrily at his opposite, the samurai-like Danger Beast saying nothing while Lucena stood close at hand with Tyrannus at the ready in case she needed to help the elder beast, though she highly doubted it considering Mephisto's wounded state.

"You...you really can't tell who your friends and enemies are, can't you…?" asked Mephisto weakly, Rafe raising an eyebrow in confusion.

"What are you talking about? Of course we can. You're the enemy."

"That is not true at all!" bellowed Mephisto before he broke out into another fit of coughing. "The real enemy has been feeding you lies and has twisted you to suit his own goals! I only realized it after I was forced to kill my beloved Noctis, and just now he confirmed it!"

"*Your beloved Noctis? You killed her because she stood in your way, and you kept on fighting until the Four Horsemen had to kill you themselves!" exclaimed Juno with fire in her veins.

Mephisto removed his only hand from his chest and choked up on his own words when he began to recall that infamous day, his heart clenching and making it hard for him to breath properly.

"No...no, that's not true at all…" he said with sorrow lacing every syllable. "Yes, I did kill her, that is the unmistakable fact. But the truth was that afterwards, I was so heart-broken I withdrew from the war myself, and Garmr took on the stead as my army's leader until he was killed. And it was only after I was struck down that I truly saw who the real enemy was...he appeared before me once before and started this whole ordeal...he is the reason for all of this."

Mephisto then pointed an accusing finger at Taiyang with a vile glare in his eyes, the elder Danger Beast remaining silent in the face of the declaration.

"That is impossible! Taiyang cares only the safety of humanity! He would never even think of trying to do such a thing as enslave the human race like you!" snarled Leonard angrily, Lucena stepping forward with a scowl on her face to argue the same point.

"That's right. You call us liars, but the only liar I see is you."

"No, please, you have to listen to him! He's telling the truth!"

Everyone turned with looks of shock on their faces at Hikari, who had finally woken up from her self-imposed stupor after being told to stand down, her sudden taking of his side again creating a sense of doubt they had previously been sure to lock away.

"Thank you...Hikari…" said Mephisto weakly.

With some effort he was able to rip off his helmet and reveal his face for the first time since Noctis, his lover, had been alive, and spit up some more blood painfully. They could all see just how much emotion he was expressing, an untold number of years of pain and suffering brought upon him by the death of his beloved revealing itself through the tears he was shedding. He then hunched over and took a few seconds to painfully remove his helmet and catch his breath, only looking back up after he had recovered some strength back.

"Yes, please, listen to me...or it will be prove to be a grave mistake. Allow me to enlighten you...your "friend"..." he said in a low tone before he pointed at Taiyang again and growled. "Whatever story he told you about me was wrong, he twisted portions of it and made it false."

"Twisted? Why would he do such a thing?"

Mephisto nod his head solemnly at Lucena's question and gazed right at her. "To get you to take his side and perceive me as the enemy. Like I said earlier, I did not continue the war after killing my beloved Noctis, and even before that, the whole event did not begin based off a whim."

The Danger Beast paused in his explanation to cough up more blood and writhe in agony. He had forgotten what it felt like to be filled with such pain, but he disregarded the feeling to continue telling the truth to those who needed to hear it before it was far too late.

"A group of humans attempted to assassinate the two of us, and I will admit that in my anger I decided to subjugate humanity...but there is more to that. One person managed to get away, the one who actually threatened me first. What he told me was "The world no longer needs the likes of you." That person is none other then the very _thing_ standing beside you."

"That is absolutely preposterous!" snarled Fiona as lightning began to lance around her as a result of her anger.

"Please…" begged Hikari, the Danger Beast glancing at her and sucking in a breath. When Mephisto noticed Fiona calm down somewhat, he stared at Taiyang and narrowed his eyes. "This is the terrible truth...Taiyang Xiao Long cares not for the safety of humans _or_ Danger Beasts, he only wishes for the security of order in the world. Anything he sees that could be a threat to this he plots to annihilate without regret or worry."

Slowly everyone's gazes began to move to their friend as Mephisto accused him of the impossible, Lucena especially trying her hardest to deny what their enemy was preaching. One look at Hikari though put cracks in this belief and even started to convince her, of all people, that maybe this idea was in fact the truth. Those doubts of hers were beginning to seem more and more like the truth then ever before.

"He was the original Danger Beast, the most powerful of them all, but when others like myself, my beloved Noctis, Rex Tyrannos and all the rest began to emerge...he considered us threats. And to be rid of us…*he disguised himself as a human and attacked me to make me believe that Humans should be destroyed, leading to the Great War between our kind that resulted in most of our species being exterminated. And then you humans began to wage war with one another, so of course he began to plot to try and wipe you all out before I intervened and tried to _protect_ all of you from him! I was only trying to protect humanity from that thing, that monster! He's already annihilated Humanity once before for the same reasons!" exclaimed Mephisto as he accusingly pointed at Taiyang again.

His words, however outrageous or unbelievable they may be, began to get through to Lucena, Junk and the others especially considering how emotional their enemy was getting over the entire matter as a whole.

"Even now, you are helping him bring about your own destruction. He was the one that told you in order to save your people, you must kill me and my allies. He didn't do so because he cared about humans, he did so in order to use you to do his dirty work while he recovered his strength for this moment in time where he would strike me down." continued Mephisto, his hand dropping back to his side. "And when I was taken care of...he was going to turn his blade on all of you and wipe out humanity so as to preserve order...just like he's done before."

If the Danger Beast had been holding a microphone, it would've just hit the ground with a deafening clang. Morgan's jaw dropped to the ground and he stared at Taiyang, Lucena doing the same while she slowly stepped back toward 1her friends and family protectively.

"If any of you are even thinking about doubting him, you'd be wrong!"

"Tyrant?! Alzora?! What are you guys doing here? And what happened to you two?" stammered Tatsumi when the two Danger Beasts flew in on Kaminari's back and landed next to them, their clothes showing off prominent bloodstains and injuries from something.

Kaminari let them down easy and then returned to human form, a mixture of shock, grief and disbelief dominating his facial expression as he stared at the silent Taiyang.

"We were talking with Taiyang about our doubts of Mephisto, in that there may be other reasons as to why he was doing what he was, but that bastard over there attacked us and almost killed us!" snarled Alzora, her word and Tyrant's putting the final nail in the coffin.

"T-Taiyang...is that true?"

The elder Danger Beast glanced over at his apprentice and said nothing, his entire demeanor and stance broadcasting all of the signals that told him the horrible truth. He began to back away in utter disbelief, he one person he thought he could trust and put his faith into instantly becoming an inhuman fiend that cared for nothing or anyone except his own selfish desires.

"You monster...I believed in you. I can't believe you would actually do such a thing! I belie-"

Kaminari's sentence was suddenly cut off when the shingling silver of Taiyang's katana was rammed through his chest and out of his back, a gasp escaping from his lips at the sudden attack by the elder Danger Beast. Lucena was rooted to the ground in shock at the betrayal, and while Kaminari stared at his master with wide eyes Taiyang only sighed heavily and lost all sense of care and well-being in his voice.

"Kaminari...you have fallen into the darkness of ignorance. For that...you must die." he said in a monotone yet vicious tone before he ripped his sword out through Kaminari's left side and watched as the Danger Beast fell to the ground and ceased all movement whatsoever.

Then he turned his attention to Lucena and raised his sword up, his stone-cold heart caring not for the friendship they once shared. "In order to preserve the order of this world...I shall destroy you. Accursed beings...you will all be exterminated."

Faster then the speed of light he swept his blade in a wide arc and just from the movement alone he created an overwhelmingly powerful shockwave that blew them away all for several meters and carved out at least five feet of dirt from the ground, sending it flying up into the air as a cloud of dust and earth. Not wanting them to have even a second of relief he brought the sword up and swung down, summing monumental bolts of lightning that consumed them all in bright flash lights and electricity.

He growled somewhat when he saw the individual bolts strike a thick dome of ice and do nothing to harm them whatsoever, the lightning storm dissipating a few moments later and revealing the cause of the dome to be Lucena.

"Taiyang! Why are you doing this?!" she demanded, but a quick flare of the elder Danger Beasts power shut her up and actually forced her to her knees just from how enormous it was.

"Silence, you ill-fated being." he said harshly, Tatsumi and Esdeath growling at the treatment of their daughter. "Enough of this trifling talk. I will exterminate you all...seeds of chaos."

Taiyang suddenly rushed Lucena with such blinding speed there was no chance for her to move out of the way or defend against him, and grasped her by the throat tightly before throwing her away back over his shoulder. To her surprise the pain from hitting the rocks never came, instead her body hitting something else that made a clanging noise on impact, and she opened her eyes to see that she had actually been caught by Mephisto just in the nick of time.

"Are you okay girl?" he asked after setting her back on her feet, Taiyang staring at them silently with his sword at his side.

"Yeah, I'm fine."

All of a sudden Mephisto stabbed his cleaver sword into the dirt at his feet and reared back, Lucena's eyes widening in shock when he plunged his own hand through his chest armor and into his own body and flesh in search of something. He coughed and grunted a few times before he found what he was looking for and ripped it straight out, revealing to her that it was in fact his own heart, Devil's Heart, which was still beating regardless of it being separated from his body.

As he collapsed to his knees, he held the heart up to her and motioned with his head at Taiyang, "Take my heart...it'll allow you to survive even death itself. Once you've killed that _thing_ , you can destroy it, lock it away, whatever you want, I don't care. And I don't care if you hate me or despise me, just please...kill him before he kills anyone else."

Lucena stared at the armored snake Danger Beast for a few more moments before she nod her head in silence and removed the heart from his grasp, Mephisto returning the gesture once before his body slumped over and uttered his final breath.

"Thank...you…" he whispered before he finally passed away, Lucena keeping her eyes on him for a couple of more seconds before she looked back at Taiyang.

Remarkably, instead of sensing the dark, vile and evil aura the heart would usually give off...she felt an almost sort of calm sensation arising from the organ...one that resonated a deep feeling of pain that yearned to be healed after being in the darkness for so long. Maybe it was just her imagination, but it felt as if Mephisto had finally become free of the torment he had gone through as a result of his previous life.

"So let me get this straight...you've manipulated an innumerable amount of people, including myself, my family, and my friends just so we could do your dirty work for you...and then you were gonna betray us in the end when we fulfilled our purpose?" questioned Lucena darkly, her unoccupied hand balling up into a fist. "My sister died to help you, and you were gonna trample all over her sacrifice like it was worth nothing?"

"It mattered not if your sister perished fighting Garmr or if I ended her existence myself. Either way she, along with all of you, were going to be annihilated regardless." Taiyang replied without any emotion or heart behind his words, his response striking everyone in the heart like a burning hot stake.

"Y-You...a monster doesn't even come *close to describing what you are…" snarled Solomon from where he stood with everyone behind the Danger Beast.

"Silence. I will deal with you lafter." said Taiyang with the wave of a hand, a bolt of lightning coming down and diverging into several smaller streams that struck the earth in a circle around the group.

Instead of disappearing, though, the lightning remained and created an impenetrable cage that prevented them from escaping, effectively trapping them.

Lucena's lips trembled as an untold amount of rage the likes she's only felt once before, with Garmr, bubbled up from the darkest recesses of her soul in response to Taiyang's betrayal. It started to react with Demon's Extract and caused ice horns to grow out the side of her head, her eyes slowly gaining a red tint to them.

She wanted nothing more then to tear the Danger Beast limb from limb, to completely and utterly destroy him and make him pay for the suffering he's brought onto so many people across countless generations.

But before she could, however, a hand slipped its way into her free hand and dissolved the fist, squeezing it tightly afterwards. Lucena was taken away from Taiyang for a moment when she looked to see who the owner of the hand belonged to. Surprisingly her eyes met those of Hikari's and almost instantly all of her anger slipped away, her mere presence relaxing her.

"Hikari…"

"I'm so sorry for not telling you the truth...it's just that I thought you wouldn't believe me, since you were still angry at me…" whispered Hikari, Lucena's expression softening. "I've probably made you think so many horrible things about me, that I'm a traitor, and a coward…"

Her eyes shot wide open when Lucena let go of her hand and hugged her, a smile appearing on her face after taking in the smell of her hair and the warmth of her skin.

"At this point, I don't care about all of that any more. I just want you to be by my side and never leave…"

Hikari shed a couple of tears of happiness and laughed, joy overwhelming her other emotions and expunging the feelings of doubt and fear from her heart.

"Lucena...was that a proposal?" asked Hikari when she was released from Lucena's embrace, the Great General winking.

"Maybe, maybe not, you'll have to wait and see later." replied Lucena before turning to stare at Taiyang with a fiery gaze. "But for now, we have some business to attend to."

Lucena, when asked by Hikari, then handed her Mephisto's still-beating heart and flinched a little when she unbuttoned her shirt's top few buttons and motioned for Lucena to hand her a sharp icicle. She complied and used the icicle to make a cut in her chest deep enough to where the heart could be inserted and link itself up. A few seconds later she grinned when the self-inflicted wound healed itself and the blood it secreted evaporated.

"Why did you want it, exactly?" asked Lucena once Hikari buttoned her shirt up again.

"It's for something my mother told me about Devil's Heart and Murasame. Just wait for a second." she replied before she grabbed the demon sword's hilt and withdrew it, its blade shimmering slightly with a dark aura.

Once she looked at the poison-coated sword she finally realized something she wouldn't have known without learning of Mephisto and Noctis. The Trump Card the two Teigu shared was not only because they were forged together, but because they were each made from a part of the two lovers themselves and were destined too always be together. Separated they were strong, together...they were a force to be reckoned with.

"She's going to use it, the Immortal Blood Seal, just like Jacqueline did that day." murmured Akame when she recognized what her daughter was doing, Tatsumi and Esdeath honing in on her when they heard.

"Let's hope that and Lucena's Tyrannus and Demon's Extract is enough to defeat Taiyang." said Leone.

"She has her sister's Teigu, Gungnir, as well. I believe she fused it to Tyrannus before we left the Empire to come and rescue you." stated Arthur before Lucena activated Tyrannus and showcased the two flaming phoenix wings the armor now possessed for all to see, the hybrid of Gungnir and Neuntote coming afterwards into her hand from a column of fire.

Taiyang merely stared at them with sword in hand, broadcasting no emotions whatsoever in response to the two and their power-ups when Hikari used the Immortal Blood Seal and gained the flame-like markings and white hair characteristic of it. He had finally had enough and summoned lightning to his side once again, his sword crackling with electricity upon absorbing some of it.

"Pathetic insects."

* * *

A/N Btw, the title of this chapter is Latin for "Golden Skin, Dark Heart". And here are the translations for Taiyang's techniques, which are Chinese.

Tiāntáng zhī léi - Heaven's Thunder

Tiāntáng zhī shǎn - Heaven's Flash


	73. Kill the God of Order

A/N You know, the be perfectly honest, I originally intended Taiyang to truly be a good guy, and Mephistopheles a horrible monster, but after recalling the mobile game I like called Brave Frontier, I changed my mind and turned Taiyang into who he is in the story. But yeah, guys, this chapter will probably be my favorite out of all the others because I drew some inspiration for it from one of my favorite anime, Gurren Lagann. Quite literally, when they made the movies for them, ESPECIALLY THE SECOND ONE, they took an already badass show and made it even MORE BADASS. If you havent watched it, please, watch it. It is friggin amazing.

Leave a fave and review!

* * *

 **Chapter 72 - Kill the God of Order**

Taiyang began to levitate off the ground and waited patiently for Lucena and Hikari to make their move, but the truth behind their silence was that they had no idea how to approach him. They most definitely had the drive and will to defeat him and make him pay for everything he's done, but after witnessing the smackdown he brought onto Mephisto...they were actually a little bit worried.

"Be turned to dust, warmongering nuisances." uttered Taiyang before he threw his free hand forward at his opponents.

Lucena and Hikari dove away to the left and right when a barrage of lightning struck the spot of earth they were standing on previously. They recovered and sprinted at Taiyang from either side, their brandished weapons doing nothing to effect the Danger Beast's posture and attitude.

Lucena unfurled her phoenix wings and lunged at Taiyang, the dragon parrying all of her blows effortlessly with only his hand and responding with his own.

A stray punch reached Lucena's shoulder and broke through Tyrannus, cracking and breaking the armor like it was a ceramic pot. Lucena grunted and tried harder to get past Taiyang's impeccable defense, but the eyes built into his armor watched her every move and broadcasted these movements directly to Taiyang, allowing him to negate all of her attacks.

She retreated after sustaining another blow to her gut that cracked the armor covering that area, and he took full advantage of the opening, drawing his sword back and locking onto her throat.

He was stopped when Hikari appeared in front of him and with a cry she slashed at his throat with Murasame, the demon blade seemingly hitting its mark when Taiyang suddenly grappled at hi throat and back off.

"Thanks for the assist Hikari." said Lucena, her interference giving her a moment of rest and a chance to repair her armor. "And there's no chance he can withstand Murasame's poison."

She was expecting a reply from. Hikari, but when she saw the frown on her face Lucena's own gin was wiped clean when she realized their fight was far from over. Her glee went to Taiyang and she growled under her breath when the dragon uncovered his throat, which had not a single mark or cut in it, Hikari's attack somehow unable to touch the Danger Beast's flesh.

"I think I figured out why he hasn't received any visible damage." said Hikari with narrowed eyes. "When Murasame was about to reach him, I saw the tiniest of sparks come from the blade. I think he must have a nigh-invisible coating of lightning over his skin that acts as a shield against physical attacks."

Lucena slowly nod her head, her statement a logical assumption. "That can explain why he was unscathed after his duel with Mephisto. If we're to make any progress we'll have to figure out a way to break through that shield."

Taiyang stared at them, emotionless, and actually sighed when he heard them talking about his barrier. If they figured out a way to negate it, he would have to expend more energy in destroying them, which is something he did not care for, but if its the only way to be rid of them, then he would have to take that chance.

Before he could counterattack Lucena and Hikari had already begun another offensive, the two rushing him yet again to put him back on his heels for a second time. Taiyang met Hikari blow for blow with his own blade, but he always sure to keep an eye on Lucena since she could intervene with one of her ice techniques at any time.

Then, like he suspected, she acted by slamming her palms to the ground and shouting, "Geforene Spiegel!"

"Fool." ridiculed Taiyang as he shot a bolt of lightning at her from his free hand, but instead of cowering away Lucena smiled.

From the ground erupted an oval-shaped ice construct with a perfectly smooth face, the mirror receiving the lightning and reflecting it straight back at Taiyang in the same amount of time it took for the lightning bolt to reach it. Hikari ducked away at the last possible second and watched as Taiyang's own lightning struck him dead-center in his chest, the bolt launching him backward with its explosive force.

"Yeah! Alright Lucena, Hikari! Kick his ass!" cheered Lubbock from behind the lightning cage, the others doing the same for the pair.

"Go get him guys!" bellowed Wave.

Taiyang growled silently under his breath as some sparks of electricity danced across his skin as a result of the lightning, but what Lucena and HIkari were more concerned with was the black scar now present on his chest. They had managed to break through the Danger Beast's shield, his own lightning providing enough penetrating power to deal some damage.

"Nice one Lucena, good thinking on your part too."

"Thanks Hikari, but don't ease up. It's gonna take a hell of a lot more of that bot bring him down." replied Lucena to Hikari's compliment when they stared down Taiyang.

The Danger Beast dusted himself off and popped his neck, seemingly brushing off the previous attack like it had been nothing. He's made his decision, enough was enough.

"I've grown weary of wasting time with you. Ill-fated beings, your end has come." murmured Taiyang when he gripped his katana with both hands.

The thunderstorm above them suddenly cracked and glowed yellow as hundreds of thousands of lightning bolts lanced from one cloud to the other faster then the eye could perceive them. Taiyang then raised his sword above his head and summoned them all to it, creating such a large concentration of lightning around him that it rivaled the Bastion in sheer size.

Lucena and Hikari were rooted to the ground, paralyzed in fear from the overwhelming power Taiyang was showing off, and within his lightning cage Tatsumi, Esdeath, Maya, Juno and all the others were deathly worried for them. They had not felt a sense of terror as great as this since the day they fought the Shikoutazer and Jacqueline.

"Perish. Shuānglóng zhàomíng lún xuánzhuǎn." spoke Taiyang, his arms swinging downward and unleashing the maelstrom of lightning that took on the shape of two monstrous dragons.

"Lucena!" shouted Tatsumi and Esdeath when the two dragons, with mouths agape and eyes blazing brightly, obliterated all the defenses their daughter created and engulfed them.

They were all horrified and left speechless when Lucena and Hikari vanished within the explosion made by Taiyang's technique, the lightning so volatile and powerful that lesser bolts shot out in all directions from the main congregation and struck the ground, creating tinder explosions that left behind nothing but ash and dust. One of these bolts hit the Bastion's entrance gate and destroyed it completely, totally annihilating the ancient stone used to build it and leaving a gaping hole in the complex.

The lightning, once its energy had been spent, eventually disappeared and revealed a heavily blackened and scarred landscape where, at ground zero, sat Lucena and Hikari. What their parents and friends saw was nothing short f a miracle.

In the split-second time lapse that existed between Taiyang using the technique and its impact, Lucena's will to survive and protect Hikari had been so great she initiated an evolution for Tyrannus that would enable her to do just that.

She withstood the lightning thanks to the evolution and the resistance the armor already gained from its encounter with Great General Budo all those years ago, and to try and shield Hikari, she had deactivated her phoenix wings and covered them both with two pairs of large dragon wings with insulating skin. Tyrannus had also changed as well, the two horns her helmet had were longer and more curly, and the front face of it had also elongated slightly and became pointer. The armor protecting her body had also become a little more bulkier, and like its previous iteration Tyrannus had replaced the cape she wore with an actual dragon tail that swished back and forth behind her.

Lucena, after realizing she was still alive, opened her eyes and let out a sigh of relief at the success of the last minute evolution. "Hikari, are you ok-"

Lucena cut herself short when she looked down and saw Hikari, who despite her efforts, somehow, someway, had been greatly affected by Taiyang's lightning and left in a grave state. Her clothes had been charred in some areas, which was hardly anything compared to the scary-looking scar on her chest that was visible through a hole in her shirt above the same spot. Lucena began to freak out when she realized the scar was directly over her heart and, fearing for her life, she quickly pressed her ear to Hikari's chest, hoping for that familiar beat that meant life.

Overwhelming waves of relief flooded her body when she heard a single heart beat, followed by the second one right after the first, which meant Mephisto's heart had survived as well and had kept her alive...just barely.

" _Thank god…_ " she thought before she looked up from Hikari to Taiyang, her feelings of joy draining away.

"It seems you were able to evolve your armor in order to survive…" said Taiyang blankly, his aloof outlook enraging her. "It will not matter regardless, your annihilation has still been set in stone."

"Shut up…" growled Lucena, the restraints on her anger loosening.

"It's pointless to continue struggling. Accept your fate and perish like the monstrous warmongers you are." stated Taiyang in a stoic tone, which only served to ignite that flame inside of Lucena and make her explode.

"Shut up! Shut up, shut up, shut _up_!" snarled Lucena furiously, a massive ring of fire bursting to life around her in response to her emotions. " _You're_ the one who's a monster! _You've_ hurt and killed so many people, innocent people! You're the one who deserves to die!"

Taiyang showed no emotional response to her outburst and waved it aside with a hand gesture, remarking, "Preposterous. I merely acted in response to the threat you humans posed to the order of the world. You, with your endless fighting and wars, _you_ with your greed, your hate, your selfishness. *You humans are the true monsters, and it is my sworn duty as guardian of the planet to prevent its destruction by ridding it of the virus that plagues it."

Lucena gasped when Taiyang suddenly vanished and reappeared in front of her in the blink of an eye, his fist clenched and inches away from her gut.

"And it's time I fulfilled that duty."

Lucena only had time to suck in a breath and clench her ab muscles before Taiyang's fist connected with her gut. Unlike before, her armor didn't quite bend so easily to his strength and only gained a slight dent, allowing her to quickly recover and fight back with Neuntote. Their weapons bounced off one another at rapid speeds, sparks were flying left and right, and every so often Lucena mixed in some ice fire from Gungnir and some of her ice to put the Danger Beast on his heels.

"Tiāntáng zhī shǎn." murmured Taiyang, Lucena recognizing the technique and quickly flying up to avoid the devastating sword slash before he could hit her.

Once she was high enough in the air she twirled Neuntote around in her hand and held it like a javelin, the tip aimed at Taiyang igniting with blue fire. "Ignis Weiser!"

She chucked the spear at her enemy and it struck the ground a foot in front of him, unleashing a devastating explosion of ice fire that turned the ground within the blast radius into a lake of ice that included Taiyang. He was frozen solid and Lucena took advantage of the situation, dropping down next to him and rearing back with Neuntote in hand, the next blow fueled with all of her hate for the Danger Beast and his deception.

The spear got within inches of his heart before the ice suddenly broke and Taiyang rammed his palm into the blade, shattering it instantly and leaving Lucena without a weapon and completely unprotected.

"Fool." said Taiyang as he brought his sword up and sliced clean through her extended right arm at the bicep, the armor doing nothing to stop his lightning infused katana.

Lucena let out a cry at the loss of her arm, and then grunted when Taiyang followed up with a devastating punch to her jaw that obliterated her helmet and sent her flying. She hit the ground with her shoulder hard and slid for a couple off more feet, her vision filled with stars, before she came to a halt and spit up blood.

"Come on, pest, try and fight against me. Weren't you trying to kill me?" demanded Taiyang, his usual emotionless state cracking.

He strided over to Lucena and kicked her in the side, throwing her across the ground for a good couple of meters before she caught herself and stood up with a slight wobble. She glanced at her severed arm and created a temporary replacement with ice, giving her back the lost limb so she could attack the Danger Beast.

"Massen Hagelsprung!" she bellowed, the clouds parting when she summoned five immense ice columns from the heavens to herself and Taiyang.

"It is futile! Tiāntáng mén!" shouted Taiyang when he planted his sword into the ground, a literal wall of lightning appearing from the thunderstorm and vaporizing two of the ice columns. "Tiāntáng zhī shǎn."

He followed up with the lightning infused sword slash and launched a wave of lightning that sliced through the remaining three ice columns and destroyed them, the quick reaction frustrating Lucena.

"Grauhorn!"

Taiyang used the large ice horn that manifested beneath him as a self-rising platform that took him high into the sky, Lucena following him up with the six wings she now had, four dragon and the other two her phoenix wings, to continue the battle.

"No matter how hard you try, no matter how much you struggle, my will is far greater then yours!" roared Taiyang when he unleashed more of his god-like power, turning into a literal bolt of lightning that zipped around Lucena, tearing her armor apart piece by piece until a final axe kick to her back completely destroyed it and sent her rocketing back toward the ground.

Taiyang soared after her and, before she hit the ground, he appeared beneath her and grabbed her by the ice arm she had created, his blade flashing yellow when he hacked off her other arm at the same spot where the right one had been severed. Then he slammed her into the ground and with a mere squeeze he shattered her ice arm, ridding her of both limbs.

Finally, with a yell, he grabbed her by the scruff off her shirt, stood her up on her feet, spun her around and with a single step he drove his sword through her upper back and out of her chest an inch above her tattoo.

"Perish…" whispered Taiyang before he twisted his katana, the movement causing Lucena to gasp and whimper in pain with wide open eyes.

He then ripped his sword back out and allowed her to stumble forward a few steps, blood gushing out of her new wound and her severed arms, and then collapsed to the frozen ground with a heavy thud.

"Lucena!" screamed Esdeath with tears pouring down her cheeks as she dropped to her knees, Tatsumi kneeling next to her and doing everything within his power to comfort her and keep himself from breaking down.

Taiyang used a foot to prod Lucena's body and roll her over onto her back, his real unseen eyes scanning her for any signs of life. On the outside she seemed dead, but she was still clinging on for the last few moments she had left.

" _So this is what it feels like to die…_ " thought Lucena, the pain from her wounds numbing her body to the point she couldn't feel anything below her waist.

" _Selena...it hurts...is this how you felt that day…?_ " she asked when she began to cry, the memory of her sister and her closeness tt death causing a hallucination of Selena to appear next to her.

She was on her hands and knees to her left, and she was looking down on her with a sorrowful expression, traces of tears in her eyes because of the dire state Lucena was in. She rested a hand on her shoulder and laid down next to her, hugging her even though she wasn't even a real person.

" _I'm sorry Sis...I broke my promise...I'm going to be coming sooner then expected…_ "

Lucena could feel herself slipping away, and with the last ounce of strength she had left she turned her head toward Hikari so she could see her one last time. Her heart, even though it was already slowing down, skipped a beat when she watched Taiyang walk towards her, his blood-soaked sword at his side and his intentions clear as day.

He was going to kill her next, and at that realization, Lucena grit her teeth and refused. She refused to give up, she refused to accept death, she refused to let him win.

" _No...I won't let him kill her. I refuse to let him touch her!_ "

Meanwhile Esdeath was still crying, with Maya and Juno joining her while Tatsumi held them all in his arms. Wave and Akame had also turned away so they wouldn't have to see their daughter be killed by Taiyang. Solomon and Morgan were regretting not being with Camilla so if they went out, they went out together, Rafe, Fiona and Leonard were all holding hands, and Lubbock and Leone, with sad smiles, hugged one another and and payed homage to their friendship.

It seemed like it was the end, there was nothing else they could do. Tyrant and Alzora were about to share their last moments as well, but before it could happen Tyrant looked over her shoulder and gasped.

"Tatsumi, Esdeath, guys! Look!" he exclaimed while pointing a finger.

His call drew the gazes of everyone trapped in the lightning cage to where his finger was pointed at, or in this case, _who_ it was pointing at.

Defying all odds and even death itself, Lucena rolled onto her stomach and grunted as she drew her knees to her chest and pushed herself up. Then she carefully stood up, since she still couldn't felt her legs, and hunched over too maintain balance when she was finally standing up. She was breathing heavily, the pain wreaking havoc on her body and nerves so great that she could barely keep herself conscious.

Taiyang paused in lining up his sword above Hikari's heart when he felt a presence behind him and glanced back, all of the eyes built into his armor focusing on the one person there and making him freeze up. For the first time he actually showed some level of shock when he gazed upon Lucena standing there, defying his will.

"Interesting...you were able to still survive? Why do you still resist?" he asked, genuinely surprised.

"I don't know if you've been paying attention all this time, but my family...we're all tough sons of bitches, and it takes _a lot_ to kill us." replied Lucena before a ring of tiny flames appeared on the ground.

They were weak at first, but slowly they strengthen in power, growing larger and more fearsome with each passing second.

Despite not having arms, Lucena sucked in a breath and yelled as loud as she could, "Tyrannus!"

The ghostly apparition of Tyrant in the draconian armor came into existence behind her and roared, the ring of fire turning into a raging inferno in response to the dragon's cry.

Solomon recognized the aura Lucena and her Teigu were giving off and grinned, the look of despair he had quickly vanished now that he knew there was still a chance Taiyang could be beaten.

"Guys, it's time we helped out Lucena." he said aloud before he rolled up his right sleeve and clenched his fist so tight it drew blood.

Before the wounds could heal he channeled a copious amount of his phoenix blood and created a large trident that solidified instantly. He waited for a gap in the lightning that made up the cage to appear, and when the window literally opened up before him he threw the trident right at Lucena with dead-on accuracy.

Lucena noticed the weapon and smiled weakly, the apparition of Tyrant raising up a hand and catching it, a mere queerest crushing it and turning it into a puddle of blood that oozed through its fingertips and began to float in the air around Lucena. The blood then began to channel itself into her severed arms, the miracle liquid instantly healing the hole in her chest and fixing all of the internal organs and body parts Taiyang's katana had damaged. Then it moved on to her arms, and before the Danger Beast's very eyes her arms regenerated good a new.

"I get it now! Everyone, follow Solomon's lead!" said Tatsumi, Juno wiping the tears from her eyes and throwing Imperator's key out of the cage onto the ground. Morgan went next, tossing Claíomh Solais next to it, followed by Fiona's Kaminari, Leonard's Kami and Enkidu, a single fireball made up of Amaterasu from Rafe, then finally Wave's Mastema.

Lucena held out a hand and the manifestation of Tyrant obliged, its hand pointing toward the collection of Teigu and creating several iron chains that lanced out and grabbed onto each like the tentacles of an octopus. One by one they were drawn back to her and absorbed into Tyrannus, increasing its power more and more until a bright orb of light manifested in the center of the apparition's chest.

Lucena closed her eyes and instantly she and the projection of Tyrant were consumed within a pillar of white light, Taiyang and everybody in attendance watching as the bare outline of her body stated to levitate and fly up within the pillar. A few seconds later, as the wind continued to wail and howl, the pillar dissipated, leaving just a solid sphere of pulsating yellowish-white energy floating several meters above the ground.

"How many Teigu did she just absorb?" asked Leone in awe of the incomprehensible amount of energy radiating from the sphere.

"Seven, and with those she already had fused Gungnir and Demon's Extract to Tyrannus, which means…" started Maya before Arthur chuckled and crossed his arms.

"She's done the seemingly impossible...fusing nine Teigu with one to simultaneously wield the power of ten of the strongest weapons ever constructed." he said when the sphere Lucena was in unfurled eight angel wings bursting with light, the limbs folding around the sphere like a protective cocoon. "With all of that power combined, its entirely possible that she can be compared to the likes of a god."

As Lucena underwent her transformation, Hikari was watching from behind Taiyang with a single eye half-open, and she couldn't help but smile weakly.

" _Lucena...win this for all of us._ "

The wings hiding Lucena then opened up and dispersed the sphere, unveiling a completely changed person that levitated in the air with the help of those eight majestic wings. She had taken on the likeness of a Valkyrie, albeit it being a little on the skimpy side, with a winged helmet made of gold and white silver, a white breastplate fashioned like a bra that showed off a large majority of her cleavage, shoulder plates, a white and gold arm sleeve for her left hand, as well as matching boots and hip guards.

Underneath her armor she wore knee-high white stockings and a black thong, which she hid behind a white piece of cloth that hung from her belt in the front and back. Another change was that her light blue hair and turned bright yellow, almost white, and gave off a little glow that matched her now red eyes.

" _Not exactly what I imaged...but hey, I'll take it._ " thought Lucena with a quirky grin before she fixed her gaze on Taiyang, who hardly reacted to her drastic power boost.

"Interesting…no one has ever accumulated such power on their own, not even Mephistopheles." remarked Taiyang as he fully turned to face her, disregarding Hikari in the process. "It seems I really will have to use my full strength in order to defeat you."

Taiyang suddenly unleashed a devastating shock wave that blew away all of the air and dust surround him, the thunderstorm responding by unleashing its own series of deafening thunder cracks that made Lucena's ears ring. Taiyang's body then began to change, his muscles growing larger and more defined, as well as his already frantic hair standing on end as electricity flowed through it.

His katana fell from his hand, and to take its place came a bolt of lightning that took on the shape of a sword. Finally he hunched over slightly and grunted when a feathered tail grew out from his lower back and swished back and forth, completely his transformation.

"Are you done?" asked Lucena, her question catching the Danger Beast off guard.

He was expecting her to be scarred or put off by his fearsome power, but instead she brushed it off like it was nothing. Because of it, he was confused and rendered immobile for a few seconds when he tried to process it.

"Yes? Good. Stand still for a moment." said Lucena before she snapped, the air rippling all around her as golden portals made of fire came into life in a matter of seconds.

Thirty, forty, fifty, the number kept growing until there were too many to count and the whole space surrounding her, Taiyang, and her trapped friends and family was occupied by the portals. Then from each portal emerged a weapon made of pure white fire, from halberds to maces, they all made their appearance and were aimed directly at Taiyang.

"That's Amaterasu's Trump Card, Gate of Hell!" said Rafe with a confident grin when he recognized his technique.

"Do you really think this'll be enough to defeat me?" questioned Taiyang as he readied himself to defend against Lucena's barrage.

"I guess we'll have to find out, huh?" replied Lucena before she unleashed the weapons all at once and continued firing, the weapons and Taiyang flying faster then the eye could see.

The ground was ripped apart by the resulting explosions from the weapons as they pursued Taiyang in his flight around the battleground, the Danger Beast avoiding every weapon and escaping without a scratch. Lucena then snapped her fingers again and from thin air materialized all of Imperator's Auxiliary Armaments as well as Neuntote, her right hand grasping Tyrannus' spear and her left going for Imperator's shield.

Once she was armed she tucked in her wings and flew down after Taiyang as her portals continued to fire an endless supply of detonating fire weapons. His lightning sword slashed and exploded into bolts of lightning with every strike it shared with Lucena's weapons, their impacts so great it created a miniature shockwave that blew through Tatsumi, Esdeath and the others like hurricanes.

"Foolish creature who is drunk on your own power...do you possess the resolve to fight the likes of me?" asked Taiyang in the midst of their duel, hiss lightning sword making it through Lucena's defenses and severing her right arm off.

A quick retreat and regeneration of the lost limb with Vile Blood Curse put her back in the fight, but instead of using her shield she grabbed Leomurg and continued to go toe-to-toe with Taiyang.

"I am prepared to sacrifice everything to ensure your disgusting species does not disturb the gentle balance of this world! Do you possess resolve that is on par with mine?!"

Lucena grunted when Taiyang blew her away with a devastating stomp too the ground, the shockwave launching Neuntote and Leomurg out of her grasp and leaving her open to attack. Demon's Extract was called upon next to create barriers of ice to block each of Taiyang's strikes when he came through the explosions of the weapons still firing from her portals.

All of her senses and stimuli were so overwhelmed that she was reacting purely on instinct, her warrior's heart that she inherited from her mother and father taking full control of her bodily functions.

"I say no! No! No! No! No! No! _Not_ in the least!" bellowed Taiyang at the top of his lungs, his cold and calculating demeanor vanishing.

He broke through Lucena's most recent ice wall and grasped her by the throat, his brute strength alone breaking her neck, and brought her down hard onto his knee. As she recited from the blow he reared back and kicked her straight up into the air, her white wings disintegrating alongside her portals since she had lost focus.

"You possess neither will!" he continued, his body transforming into a bolt off lightning that took him up to her.

"Nor resolve!" He tucked his knees up to his chest and rammed both heels into her stomach, breaking all of her ribs and spinal cord in several places.

"Nor reason!"

Lucena cried out in pain as her body struck the ground like a meter or, sending a plume of snow, ice particles and dust in al directions while Taiyang landed a few meters away and unleashed a storm of lightning from his very soul. He wasn't holding back any more, this was full strength.

"You foolish Humans use your knowledge and power to satisfy your own greed, and have grown drunk on it! It is all you are capable of doing even after I've exterminated you once before! It is for that reason that I must annihilate you all and allow you too never return to plague this world, _my_ world!"

Lucena rolled over onto her side, coughing and wheezing out blood, as she reeled from the Danger Beast's crippling attack. Thankfully the invisible barrier that surrounded her body much like a suit of armor had been able to mitigate some of the damage, and if it wasn't for the Phoenix Blood circulating through her veins that repaired her broken bones and damaged internal organs, she would've been good as dead.

" _He really is a God...to think one individual could hold this much power…_ " she thought when she returned to her feet, her gaze locked onto Taiyang's.

His attacks were devastating, his defense impeccable. She had been lucky to land a few blows on him, but he only shrugged them off like they were nothing. The only thing that actually made him hesitate was...of course.

Lucena's eyes darted over to Hikari and she spotted the unsheathed Murasame laying on the ground next to her. The girl noticed her friend's stare and nod her head once, the assassin feigning weakness to ensure she could inch her hand over to her sword so that when the opportunity presented itself they could make the handoff.

If they could somehow land a cut on Taiyang with Murasame, the lethal poison would most definitely be a hindrance to the Danger Beast even if it didn't kill him instantly. She was almost certain it wouldn't kill him instantly, his will was too strong for that.

"You continue to defy fate, even though you know what you're up against? Why?!" questioned Taiyang, his personality change actually bringing a change in the weather and causing the thunderstorm above to pick up in intensity, the signs of a downpour becoming apparent.

"Well no shit! Like hell I would give up and allow myself to be killed! You're an idiot if you believe that!" responded Lucena with fire in her tone, the cocky grin she inherited from her mother coming out. "If you say we only want to fulfill our greed and create war, then we'll stop that! I'll make sure of it!"

Lucena had to cover her face and eyes when Taiyang let loose another energy burst, the lightning storm violently crackling around his body growing larger and larger.

"Impossible! There is no way for you to accomplish a feat such as that!"

Taiyang suddenly appeared in front of Lucena again and with his arm like a lance he rammed it through Lucena's gut, his blood-soaked hand ripping through her skin out off her back and skewering her. With his other hand he grabbed her by the throat again so he could rip his other hand out through her side, her blood getting sprayed in a wide arc across the ground.

Then he channeled his lightning through his hand and into her body, her blood-curdling scream sending chills up and down her parent's and sister's spines. Lucena breath heavily when the lightning stopped and her body felt weak, the Danger Beast staring at her with its expressionless helmet for a few moments before two slits appeared and spread open, revealing a pair of blood red, slit-pupil eyes that gazed into her soul.

"Your body is broken, your soul is barely hanging on by a thread. Once I destroy your spirit, your final source of strength, I can begin the cleansing of your species from this world." murmured Taiyang as he held his free hand out, lightning sword in his fingers.

Lucena spit up blood and chuckled, her eyes locking with those of Taiyang's. "Who told you I was broken? Absolute Suppression!"

Taiyang sputtered and gasped when a powerful unseen force connected with the center of his chest and blew him away, his hand letting go of Lucena. She dropped to one knee and coughed heavily as Vile Blood Curse went to work sealing up the gash in her side and fixing everything on the inside so she could function properly again.

" _God I'll never get used to that…_ " she thought with a shudder as she manifested her wings again and soared at break-neck speeds to Hikari who was holding Murasame up in the air.

"Why you…!" snarled Taiyang angrily as he summoned forth an enormous lightning bolt from above down at Lucena, the Great General reaching Hikari and grabbing Murasame with one hand, another weapon coming int existence within the other.

"Ultimate Art: Raikiri!"

Taiyang gasped when Lucena spun around and slashed through his lightning bolt with a pitch black katana, the slash so quick that it produced its own wave of lightning that overwhelm even his sent him on the retreat to avoid its deadly arc.

Once the smoke cleared Taiyang lowered his arms and saw Lucena standing over Hikari like a guardian angel, Kaminari in one hand and Murasame in the other, the demon blade glowing with a malicious dark purple aura that contrasted Lucena's pureness. However, she dropped Kaminari, the sword turning into light particles as soon as it hit earth, and reached down to Hikari with a reassuring smile on her face.

She nod her head and Lucena used an icicle to retrieve Mephisto's heart from inside her chest, the heart beating softly in her grasp.

"This blade is said to be cursed, its poison so lethal that no one has ever survived being cut by it." stated Lucena as she held Murasame up. "And this heart was said to be demonic, its bloodthirstiness the same as its previous owner."

Lucena then absorbed Mephisto's heart through her skin and bonded with the Teigu, its tendrils connecting with her arteries and veins to make her skeletal structure ultra-dense and hard to break. Then she grabbed Murasame's hilt with her other hand and pointed the blade at Taiyang, her cocky smile fading.

"These two were made from pieces of the two people that you deceived, the heart from Mephistopheles, and Murasame's poison from his lover, Noctis. With these two, I'll bring an end to your deception and treachery once and for all."

Taiyang growled under his breath and clenched hiss fists tightly, the lightning sword breaking apart into tiny sparks now that it was no longer needed.

"This is not over yet...such arrogance coming from a lowly species such as yourself!" he yelled, his body starting to bubble and morph as hiss grip on his human form started to slip. "I will make you regret it!"

Lucena's shoulders dropped ever-so-slightly when Taiyang hunched over and began to grunt and snarl like a mindless, ordinary Danger Beast, his human form losing its muscular shape and gaining scales. Suddenly, when it finally reached a breaking point, Taiyang's back ripped open and he roared as his true from ssnaked upward into the sky, its release finally causing the thunderstorm to release all of the water it was building up as a torrential downpour that sizzled against the lightning ran the length off the dragon's body.

The Bastion and the area surrounding it were dwarfed by the sheer size of Taeyang's true form, the size he was back in his library small in comparison to what he was now, with no walls or tunnels to restrict him. He roared once more, and the thunderstorm poured out an endless swarm of lightning bolts that lit up. the sky like some sort of beacon, signaling the arrival of a God on earth.

"You shall all burn in the everlasting hellfire of my divine lightning. Be utterly annihilated, down to the very last scrap of DNA!" he proclaimed, his voice oozing power, as his lightning laid waste to the land.

Lucena heard the cries for help coming from her friends and family and reacted quickly, her first action to grab the weakened Hikari and fly her over to them once she used her own power to dispel the lightning cage trapping them. With Leonard's Teigu she forcefully dug out a deep hole in the round and ordered everyone to go underground, and not to come up until she told them too.

"Lucena…" said Tatsumi, his daughter turning to look at him and her mother.

"Win." Esdeath finished for him with a smile before she created several layers oof ice over themselves to cover the hole.

Lucena smiled back and then looked to the monstrous Taiyang Xiao Long, the god-like dragon staring back at her with fire in his eyes.

"Alright, you son of a bitch…" she growled as her wings unfurled as far as they could go, the almost pitch-black aura from Murasame immediately turning red when she cut the palm of her right hand, producing a series of flame-like tattoos that spanned the length of her right arm. "It's time we ended this."

She took the skies and rushed Taiyang, the massive dragon roaring as he flew up into the raging thunderstorm to draw her into its depths. Lucena was almost blinded by the raindrops whirling around through the clouds, and every flash of lightning made her think that Taiyang was right there in front of her. The thunderstorm must be exceptionally large if the dragon could hide himself so easily within it, so she kept her guard up and waited for him to come out into the open.

"You're in my domain now. I am in control of everything within this storm!" bellowed Taiyang seemingly from everywhere at once, his voice just as loud as the thunder ringing in Lucena's ears.

Suddenly she darted to the left when the dragon rocketed out from a group of cloud with his mouth agape, razor sharp teeth glistening from the flashes of lightning. Lucena righted herself and chased after Taiyang, grunting when she deflected several lightning bolts that he fired at her from all sides.

"Taiyang!" she shouted as she lunged at his neck with Murasame and smashed through the lightning barrier covering his skin, the blade plunging through his scaly hide and injecting its vile poison into his bloodstream.

Taiyang grumbled when it instantly felt the poison's effect weaken him, but he steeled his nerves to slow down its spread swiped at Lucena with his tail. She just barely avoided the limb and retreated, a stray lightning bolt catching her off guard and hitting her right shoulder with enough force to stun her for a few moments.

Another roar from Taiyang filled her ears and she cursed when the dragon was right on top of her, his gaping maw coming straight at her. She felt like a mountain had been thrown at her when they collided, his feet and hands keeping herself from falling down the dragon's gullet.

Seeing down the dragon's throat, however, gave her an idea and with a grin she yelled, "Let's see how you deal with this!"

Then she let go of Taiyang's teeth and allowed herself to be swallowed by the dragon, his lips clamping shut when she vanished into the darkness of his inner bowels.

"Finally, that insec is-urgh!" said Taiyang before he grunted and halted in midair.

He started to writhe in pain, his insides feeling as if they were getting ripped to shreds. With a guttural, agonizing shriek an explosion of blood emerged from his side and Lucena flew out with Murasame covered in the dragon's bodily fluids. Taiyang shivered and glanced back at the exit wound, his eyes narrowing when the black marks consistent with the poison of the cursed blade began to wiggle and spread across his skin like a virus.

"No...I will not...allow it…!" murmured Taiyang in defiance, his gaze moving to Lucena.

He mustered up all of his strength and summoned the largest amount of lightning yet before he took off, charging Lucena with a deafening roar escaping from his lips. She gripped Murasame tightly and readied herself for the dragon, her eyes narrowed so she could see her target clearly through the rain and wind. When he was so close she could feel the electricity in the air, she moved to the right and let it a battle cry as she dug Murasame into his cheek and yanked with all of her might

With the strength-enhancing abilities she possessed from Tyrannus, Imperator, Devil's Heart, and Vile Blood Curse, as well as her own monstrous strength, she actually swung Taiyang around to the side so that when she freed the sword his head was right beneath her feet, totally unprotected.

"Guillotine Drop!" yelled Lucena at the top of her lungs when she drove both feet deep into Taiyang's temple.

Taiyang was propelled downward by Imperator's technique, his head breaking the sound barrier when it emerged from the storm clouds. When terminal velocity was reached, Lucena removed herself and watched Taiyang's weakened Cody smash into the earth with force of a meteor.

Then, as the cherry on top, she pointed her index finger toward the sky, a tiny ball of ice appearing an inch above it.

"Arctic World." she uttered, the ball growing exponentially large in a matter of seconds until it was as big as a small planetoid.

With a grunt she hurled the immense mass of ice down at the fallen Taiyang, her Trump Card the finishing move that would bring an end to the dragon's life once and for all.

With an echoing boom the planetoid crushed Taiyang beneath its immeasurable weight, Lucena smirked when after a minute of silence, she snapped her fingers and turned the sphere into a cloud of ice particles that drifted over the frozen tundra.

Lucena slowly floated to the ground as the thunderstorm above lost its roar and simmered down to a light drizzle, the rain no longer hindering her vision. She emerged through the dust and came to a heavily wounded Taiyang, the dragon back in its human form since he had not the strength to maintain his original form, and tightened her fingers around Murasame.

Lucena's footsteps routed him out of his stupor and they stared one another down in dead silence. Murasame's poison was drawing ever closer to his heart, his vision was blurry, and his breaths were slow and skay. All of these were signs pointing to his imminent demise, and he made not one attempt to prevent it.

"You...foolish Humans…" murmured Taiyang, his voice even colder then before.

Lucena almost felt bad for the Danger Beast and his decrepit state, but she locked away those feelings and only looked at him with a blank expression devoid of any emotion. He had annihilated humanity once before and caused a war between two entire races...he deserved what he was going through.

"With my death, order will cease to exist...the world shall be ruled by chaos...and I will only grieve as the destruction of this world unfolds…"

"Weren't you listening earlier? We're gonna prevent all of that from happening." spoke up Lucena with a slight grin, her usual cheery self making a comeback. "If there's conflict, I'll stop it. I promise."

Taiyang looked at her for a few more seconds before he took in his final breath and closed his eyes, the muscles in his legs mere seconds from giving out. Murasame's poison was within inches of his heart, and as he uttered his final words, it accomplished its gruesome deed.

"If this is how it must be...protect this planet at all costs…"

Taiyang was dead before his body hit the ground, and when he moved no more, Lucena exhaled in relief and unlocked her stiffened shoulders. She searched for Murasame's sheath and eventually found it, the sword sliding back into place in its rightful home when she slipped it on, before she turned her attention to the hole she had created for Hikari and the others.

She rapped her knuckles on the ice cover and a few seconds later it vanished, Tatsumi and Esdeath emerging from the depths first, followed by Maya and Juno, Wave, Akame, Hikari, then Rafe and Fiona, their son Leonard, and then finally Leone and Lubbock joined by Solomon and Morgan.

"So...it's over?" asked Hikari weakly, she still hadn't recovered fully from Taiyang's earlier attack.

"Yeah, it is. I was able to do it." replied Lucena with a smile before the armor she wore flickered, showing her original outfit for a fraction of a second. "Um...I'm gonna give back everyone's Teigu...I feel like I'm about to pass out at any second…"

One by one, Lucena extracted the Teigu given to her by everyone from Tyrannus, returning them to their proper owners until she returned to normal and the only ones she had left to give were Devil's Heart, Vile Blood Curse and Murasame.

"Thanks for this...if I didn't have it I probably wouldn't have survived…" said Lucena when Solomon opened a tiny cut in her hand and removed his Phoenix Blood cells from her system.

"Of course." he replied with a wink.

Lucena then turned to Hikari and first handed her back Murasame, which she gladly took from her. When it came to Devil's Heart, she was conflicted on what do with the heart. So instead of making a decision herself, she made the next best choice and consulted Hikari.

"Hikari, what do you think we should do with Mephisto's heart? I wanted to ask you first, since you were the closest to him over all of us."

"Um...if it's okay with you, and everyone else here...c-could I keep the heart? I don't want it to be destroyed. I feel like he was just trying to make things right, and that I think he succeeded at least, in the end." said Hikari nervously, since she was still concerned with her doubts about if she would still be accepted by everyone.

After a few seconds of silent deliberation, completely opposite of what she expected, everyone agreed and Lucena smiled happily as she removed Mephisto's heart from her chest and offered the organ to Hikari. She took it into her hands and shed a single tear as she took the heart back into her body and felt its gentle aura again, the vile and evil feeling it once possessed no longer present with the heart.

"We did it Mephisto...we did it..."

 **\- Purgatory -**

Mephisto walked into the circular room containing the gate to what he assumed would take him hell, its golden workmanship a ploy to make him think he was going somewhere better. He no longer wore his armor, just a simple white suit with matching shoes and dress pants, and when he approached the gate he sighed heavily.

"I guess it's now or never." he murmured as he took his eyes off the gate for a few moments.

When he looked back, however, he was stunned to see Noctis in an all-white, almost see-through dress standing there in front of the gate with the warmest and purest of smiles on her face. He wasn't sure whether to believe it was real at first, but when she spoke, her voice like silk, he knew it wasn't a dream at all.

"Hello Mephisto...I've been waiting for you." she said as she walked down the steps and took one of his hands into her own. "It took a while, but you finally came."

Mephisto didn't know what to say, his mouth only opening and closing in shock. Noctis noticed this and only continued to smile, her kindness knowing no bounds even to the person whom she had loved that had killed you.

"If you're worried that I might hate or resent you...I don't. I could never hate you, my beloved. I'll love you, and continue to love you, despite all of your mistakes."

At those words Mephisto finally gave in and started to cry tears of joy, the darkness that had plagued him for so long finally disappearing. "I-I'm sorry...that it took me so long…to get here…"

Noctis massaged the back of his hand and then cupped his cheek, kissing him on the lips while she beckoned him toward the gate.

"It's okay. Now come on, my beloved, it's time we left for a better place."

Mephisto took Noctis' hand and followed her to the gate, her shining smile becoming even brighter when they stepped through and lost their clothing, their temporal bodies and souls being transported to exactly where she had said.

A better place, one without any worries or evil. A Pure Land, one where he finally felt all of the sins crawling on his back dissipate into nothingness.

" _Thank you…_ "

* * *

A/N Here are more translations

Shuānglóng zhàomíng lún xuánzhuǎn - Twin Dragon Lightning Wheel Rotation

Tiāntáng mén - Heaven's Gate


	74. Unity

A/N First thing I'd like to say is that yes I probably used a little too much stuff from Gurren Lagann in that last chapter, so I apologize if that made reading it a little less pleasurable due to the many similarities. And there are song lyrics in this chapter, so when you guys get to it, go ahead and search up the song so that way you can listen along to it and know how the song flows in beat/tempo, y'know. I'll include it at the end of the chapter.

Also guys, the next Akame ga Kill story I have planned to write, it's gonna be fantastic. I just came up with an idea that's gonna be soooooo good that I can hardly wait. I dunno if its gonna be as long as this story either, probably not, but I'll be damned to try and make as good as this one to the best of my abilities.

Leave a fav and review!

* * *

 **Chapter 73 - Unity**

 **\- Two Weeks Later -**

The threat of the Danger Beasts that had arisen from antiquity had vanished, and the nations of the world responded with a huge collective sigh of relief. Rebuilding had commenced in the Western Nations to repair the damage caused by Garmr, and normal life eventually resumed across the globe.

Any and all ill feelings toward Hikari were gone, and she was welcome back to the Imperial Capital with a huge party that Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya held at their place. It was the first time for them in a while when they could just relax and have some fun. Everyone had been invited to join in on the festivities, and pretty much everyone outside of Solomon, who wore his usual hoodie and baggy pants, dressed up to a certain extent for the gathering.

Tatsumi kept it simple with a standard black suit, dress pants, tie and shoes, Esdeath wore a honey colored dress with a matching hair band, and Maya chose a dark purple Empire dress with light purple streaks along the hemline. Juno remained in her usual attire, and Lucena chose to tie her hair into a ponytail and wear a white one-shoulder dress that seemed just a tad-but too small, since her bust was emphasized heavily.

When Akame and Wave showed up with Hikari, Wave had taken a similar route as Tatsumi only instead of black his attire was navy blue, and Akame had put on a black jumper dress. Hikari had Then came Lubbock and Leone, the latter making a statement with a relation skin-tight Qi Pao, followed by Rafe, Fiona and Leonard. Solomon and Morgan showed up soon after with Camilla, who had made the journey from Straelka to be there, and then finally Leone and Lubbock brought up the rear.

Arthur had some business to attend to and Tyrant and Alzora wished to be alone to do their own thing, which everyone pretty much knew exactly what that meant.

"Wow...I haven't indulged myself like this in a long time…" said Lucena with a happy sigh, the wine glass in her hand half full after she had taken a couple of sips.

"You can say that again...I've been needing this." said Juno with a noticeable slur.

Juno was already a little buzzed, to say the least, from all the wine she had consumed, and Lucena couldn't help but giggle at her. Leone, who was also feeling the effects of the wine, but on a lesser scale then Juno, then plopped down on the couch next to Lucena and grinned at her as she swished the wine around in her glass.

"So, Lucena...did you get it?" she asked curiously.

"Yeah, a few days ago."

"You gonna do it? Are you gonna ask her?" pressed Leone with a twinkle in her eyes, Lucena rolling hers at her eagerness.

"Well duh, of course I am. After I finish this wine first, though." she replied, the pair sharing a laugh before they touched glasses and proceeded to drink.

Once Lucena made it through her glass she set it down on a nearby table and moved one of the couch pillows to the side, uncovering a tiny box that she had hidden there earlier. Her parents of course, ever vigilant, had caught her in the act when they were preparing for the party, but they only winked and said nothing.

She scanned the living room after grabbing the box and spotted Hikari standing near the center ofthe room, alone, a huge smile on her face when she witnessed Solomon faceplanting onto the floor. Lucena laughed too at the Kaiser's inability to hold his alcohol, which always proved time and time again to be a hilarious sight to see.

" _Here goes nothing._ " she thought as she hid the box behind her back and walked over to Hikari.

She noticed her coming and waved at her, Lucena returning the gesture with a wave of her own. "Hey Lucena."

"Hello. You enjoying the party?" asked Lucena as they observed the party, more specifically Solomon's family trying to get him back on his feet.

"Yes, it's so lively. After everything that happened with Mephisto and all...I'm glad that we're able to have fun again like this." replied Hikari, he smile slipping near the end of her sentence.

Suddenly she hugged Lucena and buried her face into her cleavage embarrassing her a little and causing her cheeks to redden.

"Lucena, I'm so...so sorry leaving. I can't stop thinking about it, and I couldn't be happier that we didn't have to fight...I wouldn't have been able to bring myself to do such a thing…" said Hikari with a shudder, Lucena wrapping her face hand around her and gently stroking her hair to calm her.

"So am I, Hikari. And it's okay, I understand." said Lucena with a caring tone, Hikari lifting her head up to look her in the eyes.

"If there's anything I can do to make it up to you, I'll do it. *Please." she pleaded with her, Lucena smiling inwardly when she saw her chance.

"Well...there is _one_ thing…" murmured Lucena as she slipped out of Hikari's arms and took a step back.

By now the party had simmered down and they were unknowingly the center of attention for everyone standing in the living room. Tatsumi, Esdeath and Maya were next to Akame and Wave with expectant grins on their faces, once all five of them knew what was about to occur in the next few seconds.

Hikari at first was confused, but when Lucena lowered to one knee before her she was totally caught off guard. Her eyes grew wide and she covered her open mouth with her hands, the shock rendering her incapable of doing anything else except stare. Lucena then pulled out the small box from behind her back and held it up, her heart beginning to beat out of her chest.

"Hikari, would you marry me?" she asked, the room dead silent.

Hikari couldn't formulate any woods at all, the only thing emerging from her lips the very air she breathed. Her dream was becoming a reality right before her very eyes, and she was struggling to respond since it all happened so quickly and so suddenly.

She finally decided on action rather then speech after another few seconds, so with traces of joyous tears she uncovered her mouth, smiled as warmly as she could, and nod her head many times over.

Lucena then stood up and, to the resounding applause of their friends and family, embraced Hikari and gave her a kiss with all of the love and passion for her contained within it. Whee they separated Hikari brought her left hand up so Lucena could remove the ring she had bought her, a silver ring with a blue tint to it, and slide it onto her ring finger.

"Well...Akame, Wave…" started Tatsumi when he turned to his two long times friends and offered Wave a hand. "I guess we're gonna be in-laws."

"I guess we are." replied Wave with a chuckle as he shook hands with Tatsumi.

The party, which had been dying out a little earlier, immediately picked back up thanks to the energy and good spirit Lucena and Hikari's engagement created. And, of course, to top it all off, Solomon drank even more wine and broke into the champagne, which led to the Kaiser collapsing once again a few minutes later and passing out entirely.

 **\- Five Days Later -**

Instead of going all out and holding a massive wedding ceremony like their parents, Lucena and Hikari wanted it to be a small wedding where only their closest friends and family would be invited. They also decided on Lucena's house being the location, since the backyard was large enough and they could hold the dance afterwards in the mansion itself.

Both of them were excited and nervous at the same time, but their nervousness paled in comparison to their other emotions. When they each went out the night before the big day with their families, Lucena and Hikari lost their worry and fully committed themselves to what was to come.

The next day came and before they went to be dressed by Tatsumi and Akame respectfully, Lucena and Hikari had to figure out just what exactly they should wear.

"So, should we both wear dresses, or should I wear the suit?" asked Lucena, but Hikari shook her head and smiled while pointing at her.

No, you wear the dress and I'll wear the suit." she replied back.

"But I'm the one who asked you, so if anything I sh-" Lucena began to say before she was cut off by Hikari kissing her on the lips.

She retreated back when she was finished and looked at her with love in her eyes, a love so alluring and overpowering it made Lucena blush and forget what she was going to say.

"Lucena, I want you to wear the dress because while I'd look pretty, you will look absolutely _beautiful_." she said with all of her heart.

Lucena giggled and agreed without further argument, the duo then separated to go with their parents to opposite ends of the mansion. Tatsumi led his daughter into his own bedroom, and upon entering she was blown away by the wedding dress her parents had got for her.

"Let's get you all ready, Sweetheart."

Meanwhile Hikari, with Akame's help, was putting on her suit that the groom would wear and mentally preparing herself. She stood in front of the mirror in her chosen room as Akame adjusted her bow tie, and when she finished they both stood there admiring her.

"I can't believe my baby girl is getting married…" said Akame happily with a tinge f something else underlying he tone.

Hikari glanced back over her shoulder and recognized the longing in her eyes, and immediately turned around so she could hug her mother. "You're wishing that Aunt Kurome was here...right?"

Akame nod her head once and wiped a stray tear away before it fell down her cheek and smiled, saying, "Yes...but I know that even though she isn't here physically, she'll be watching with Selena and everyone else who would've wanted to see this."

With her outfit complete, they left the unused bedroom and navigated the mansion's interior until they reached the doors to the backyard. Akame pushed them open and walked her daughter down the aisle toward the raised altar where Wave, the chosen best man, stood with the priest.

Rows of chairs were situated on either side of the aisle, and seated in them was everyone that she and Lucena knew from across the globe.

On the left-hand side, from the back there was Rafe, Fiona, Leonard and Morgan, followed by Solomon, Camilla, Chelsea and the older Wilhelm in the next row up, and then finally at the front was Wave, an empty seat for Akame, and a seat that was occupied by a framed picture of Kurome. The right hand side consisted of Lucena's family for the most part, with Esdeath, an empty seat for Tatsumi when he arrived, and Maya at the front. Behind then sat Juno, Lubbock, Leone and a seat with Selena's picture in it that was directly behind Esdeath's chair. The third and final row held Arthur, Alzora and Tyrant, the two Danger Beasts giving her a thumbs up when she walked by.

Finally she reached the altar and said hello to the priest while her mother took her seat next to Wave, silence once again regaining control of the backyard once her footsteps ceased. And now they waited, with Hikari keeping herself occupied by admiring the work done with the altar and decorations. The whole set-up gave off a wintry feeling, with the white chairs, white carpet that was rolled down the aisle, and the seemingly endless bouquets of light-blue, almost white, roses that contained actual ice flowers in them.

What made the whole experience that much more sweeter was that the Empire was entering its winter months, and on that day, at that particular moment, clouds blanketed the sky and it actually began to snow on the Imperial Capital. Not too hard where it was unbearable, and not too soft that it was barely noticeable, just the right amount that made the atmosphere perfect.

When it seemed like it would take a few for the ceremony to get underway, the same doors Hikari walked through were opened by Tatsumi, and he stepped aside with a proud smile to let his daughter walk out. The reaction was the same across the board...utter shock and awe.

Lucena couldn't help but blush as she came striding down the aisle with her father at her side, the dress she wore a truly beautiful sight to behold. Instead of being one specific style, Lucena's dress was actually a hybrid that took certain aspects and mixed them all into one.

Its predominant feature was the mermaid silhouette that followed her form from her waist down to her mid-thigh and then flared out at the bottom, the white fabric gaining a light blue color tint to it. The upper half of the dress had a laced tattoo back that started at her lower back all the way to her neck, the image in the fabric a elegantly crafted snowflake, and then finally the dress completed itself on the front portion that split into a v-neck that came back together halfway down her cleavage.

Everyone was mesmerized by her dress and the sparkle it gave, and upon closer inspection they could see that there was actual ice crystals imbued in the fabric, most likely added by Esdeath, that twinkled whenever a ray of light would pass through it. To complete her image, a veil connected to a white hair band sporting a single light blue rose covered her face, and clasped in her hands in front of her chest was a bouquet of white and light blue roses.

Tatsumi left her daughter's side when she reached the altar and he sat down next to Esdeath, his happiness spreading like a contagious virus to Esdeath and the rest of his family. The murmurs of awe that drifted through the rows of guests quieted down now that they were both present, and they waited for the ceremony to begin.

Hikari couldn't take her eyes off of Lucena when they stood in front of the priest, Lucena doing the same thing. What they were experiencing right then, it was all so surreal.

They were only brought back to reality when the priest addressed them directly, his first question directed toward the crowd as per custom. "First, I am required to ask anyone present who knows a reason why these persons may not lawfully marry, to declare it now."

It was utterly silent, and this coupled with the happy expressions everyone had on their faces told him that this was hardly something to talk about, so he cleared his throat and looked to Lucena and Hikari directly.

"The vows you are about to take are to be made in the presence of God, who is judge of all and knows all the secrets of our hearts; therefore if either of you knows a reason why you may not lawfully marry, you must declare it now." he asked of them, and like previously, they said nothing.

He nod his head and, with his gaze on Hikari first, asked, "Hikari, will you take Lucena to be your life-long partner? Will you love her, comfort her, honor and protect her, and, forsaking all others, be faithful to her as long as you both shall live?"

"I will." replied Hikari.

The priest then turned to Lucena, "And Lucena, will you take Hikari to be your life-long partner? Will you love her, comfort her, honor and protect her, and, forsaking all others, be faithful to her as long as you both shall live?"

"I will." said Lucena with every fiber of her being.

The priest then turned to his left and motioned with a hand, the now standing Arthur approaching him with their gold rings on a white pillow. The priest thanked the Emperor and turned back to Lucena and Hikari with the pillow, a couple of snowflakes coming to rest on the fabric.

"I now offer you these rings that will serve as the symbols of your love and devotion to one another."

Lucena and Hikari each grabbed a ring, the first to receive theirs being Lucena when Hikari grabbed her right hand and slid her ring on. Lucena did the same for her, and when they both donned their rings they turned back to the priest to await his final statement.

"With these rings that you now wear, and the vows that you have taken, and with the power bestowed onto me, I now pronounce you two married in holy matrimony." May your bond never break, your love never falter, and that the rest of your lives together be filled with happiness." he announced before he held his arms behind his back and gave a nod of consent to them.

Lucena and Hikari faced one another and Hikari raised the veil covering Lucena's face up and over her head, freeing her loving smile from its confines. Without wasting any more time, Lucena tossed her flower bouquet over her shoulder, intertwined her hands with Hikari and kissed her passionately to seal their marriage.

The crowd of family and friends erupted into cheers and bouts of clapping, the newly-weds stopping in their kissing to smile.

The procession quickly moved from the backyard to the circular windowed room that, with Lucena's piano acting as a centerpiece, would hold the post-marriage dance and party to celebrate. The dance went off without a hitch, with Lucena and Hikari having their own dance to the music of a band from Straelka named Crown the Empire, who actually showed up personally thanks to certain Kaiserin, Solomon got drunk off the champagne again much to the chagrin of his wife and son, and Lucena and Hikari were showered with attention from the attendees wishing them a happy life.

It was here when Lucena noticed her mother set something down on her piano and wink at her, the certain something she set down easily being recognized by Lucena as her lyric sheets that she had written. She knew exactly what Esdeath was wanting her to do and nervously gulped, her fear of playing in front of a crowd returning.

Suddenly a hand placed itself on her shoulder and she jumped, but she calmed down when she saw it was only Wave. He grinned at her and said, "Do it, she'll love it."

Lucena stared at him for a few seconds before she nodded and made her way to the piano, the lyric sheets for her song looking back at her from the music rack, ready and waiting. Wave grabbed the microphone used by everyone earlier to say their pieces about the newly-weds and tapped it a few times, the beating sound coming from the speakers drawing everyone's attention to him.

"Excuse me, everyone. If you all could remain silent, there's a little something that Lucena's got for us." he said as he motioned to her.

He carried the microphone and its stand to her and whispered good luck as he set it down on her right, close enough so that it could pick up her voice clearly without any interference. Lucena gulped again when she saw everyone's eyes glued on her, but when she saw Hikari's and the look of intrigue she had, her nervous feeling vanished and she smiled.

"Hello. Um, yes, I do have something. It's a song that I, um...that I wrote myself." she said with a slight stutter before she locked gazes with Hikari. "Hikari...this is for you."

With that, she took a deep breath, held her fingers over the first few keys needed for the song's intro, and closed her eyes while she still smiled. Then she began, the heavenly shrill of the piano filling up the room with its beauty and mesmerizing everyone under its trance, Hikari's eyes widening in utter shock at how easily and masterfully Lucena played the instrument. When she started to sing, however, was when she was utterly blown away.

"You and I...we're like fireworks and symphonies exploding in the sky. With you...I'm alive...like all the missing pieces of my heart, they finally collide. So stop time right here in the moonlight, 'cause I don't ever wanna close my eyes."

Lucena bobbed her head forward slightly when the tone of the piece shifted and she said with such passion in her voice, "Without you, I feel broke, like I'm half of a whole. Without you, I've got no hand to hold. Without you, I feel torn, like a sail in a storm. Without you, I'm just a sad song...I'm just a sad song…"

Everyone remained utterly silent as the first few verses of the song were completed, Lucena's hands sliding on the piano keys like those of an expert as she took a quick glance at her music sheet to look at the next page and then closed her eyes yet again, the lyrics of the next part coming into her mind.

"With you...I fall...It's like I'm leaving all my past in silhouettes upon the wall. WIth you I'm a beautiful mess...it's like we're standing hand in hand with all our fears upon the edge. So stop right here in the moonlight, 'cause I don't ever wanna close my eyes." she sang, her voice like an angel's. "Without you, I feel broke, like I'm half of a whole. Without you, I've got no hand to hold. Without you, I feel torn, like a sail in a storm. Without you I'm just a sad song."

All of a sudden the band members of Crown the Empire joined in, matching their instruments up perfectly with Lucena's piano to make a perfectly crafted song that conveyed her love for her significant other, who was watching her and nothing else. When Lucena opened her eyes in surprise, the leader of the band, Leo, winked at her and told her silently to keep going, the other band members each mouthing her to as well.

With the help of a professional band, Lucena pressed on with her song and really poured every part of her heart and soul into the final half of her song.

"You're the perfect melody, the only harmony I wanna hear...You're my favorite part of me, With you standing next to me, I've got nothing to fear. Without you, I feel broke, like I'm half of a whole. Without you, I've got no hand to hold. WIthout you, I feel torn, like a sail in a storm. Without you, I'm just a sand song."

The band really picked up now, and alongside it Lucena continued to sing and repeat the previous verse, "Without you, I feel broke, like I'm half of a whole. Without you, I've got no hand to hold. WIthout you, I feel torn, like a sail in a storm…"

Then, like they had been rehearsing it for months on end, the band cut off their instruments so that Lucena's piano was the only thing making noise at this point, the next few lines of her song the finale that would close it up all together. At this she opened her eyes and looked at Hikari with the same loving smile she had given her when they had stood a foot apart on the altar.

"Without you...I'm just a sad song...I'm just a sad song…"

Lucena then held the last notes for a couple of seconds longer before she lifted her hands up off the keyboard and let out a sigh. No sooner then she finished did the whole room erupt into applause, even the band members of Crown the Empire were clapping for her, and she couldn't help but feel an overwhelming sense of accomplishment in response. However, the greatest feeling of satisfaction came when the clapping stopped as Hikari walked up to her.

She was covering her mouth with her hands and tears were streaming down her cheeks out of happiness, the song so powerful that she couldn't even speak her mind about how much it meant to her.

Thankfully, words were required for either of them when Lucena stood up and hugged Hikari, the two not separating from one another for a least a minute when Hikari cried silently into her shoulder, saying over and over again that she loved her with all of her heart.

The party continued for a good while until everyone started to grow weary and tired with, the allure of sleep creeping up on all of them. Camilla and Morgan with Wilhelm and a totally smashed Solomon departed first, followed by Rafe, Fiona and Leonard bidding their farewells to return to the Western Nations. Lucena and Hikari were about to retire themselves, but before they could Arthur tapped them both on the shoulder.

"Could I ask you two something?" he asked somewhat awkwardly.

"Uh, sure thing. What is it?" Lucena asked.

"This is going to be a little personal, I know, but...were you two thinking of wanting a child?"

Hikari and Lucena's expressions changed to surprise at the question, the two looking at one another for a few moments since, to be honest, they had thought about it. They just never talked about the *how factor considering they were booth girls, which would make it quite difficult.

"W-Well yeah, but...we're both girls, so…" said Hikari as she turned back to Arthur.

The Emperor then crossed his arms and grinned, Lucena and Hikari guessing that he must have some sort of answer to their plight.

"What if I told you that myself and the Empire's best doctor have come up with a method for female same-sex partners to a conceive a child on their own?" he asked of them both, his grin widening when the two girls stared at him in utter shock.

"What? Really?!"

"Come to the central hospital tomorrow, both of you. I'll explain more of it to you there. And congratulations once again." said Arthur before he spun around and left Lucena and Hikari hanging on a thread.

They decided to talk about his offer later and, at the behest of Lucena, they said to their parents they were going to go to bed since night had already begun to arrive outside. Hikari certainly thought they were going to bed, but as they climbed the stairs to the second floor Lucena grinned, another plan in her mind.

As soon as they entered her room, Lucena shut the door and locked it tight. She gave Hikari a mischievous smile when she looked back at her in confusion, her actions telling her something was amiss.

"Uh, Lucena? You okay?"

"Yes, I'm fine…" she replied before she reached around and slowly unzipped her wedding dress from the back. "It's just that I don't think I can hold myself back any more…"

Hikari's cheeks were instantly flushed with red when the wedding dress from from Lucena's shoulders into a crumpled mess around her feet, revealing her half-naked body and the lingerie she wore. It was all white, the bra, the panties, the garter belt and the stockings, and to make Hikari even more uncomfortable, Lucena was standing there with her hands erotically covering her breasts and privates, a heavy blush on her face as well.

It didn't take much to convince Hikari to strip off her own clothing, and soon enough they were both naked and totally absorbed in one another atop Lucena's bed. Hikari moaned as Lucena suckled on the side of her neck and gently massaged her vagina's folds with her index, middle, and ring fingers. Lucena brought her head up and kissed Hikari deeply, stifling the louder moan that came when she pushed her fingers into entrance and rubbed her on the inside.

"You have no idea how long...I've wanted to do this…" said Lucena when she took her lips away from Hikari to catch her breath.

No other words were exchanged before Lucena returned to kissing Hikari for another minute or so. When she was satisfied the horny Great General moved down to Hikari's left breast, her lips wrapping around her pink nipple so she could suck on it.

Hikari could hardly contain herself, her mind was turning blank at the overwhelming pleasure she was experiencing from Lucena, and when she felt Lucena's tongue start to swirl lightly around her nipple she was pushed over the edge.

"High...ah, don't stop...please, I-I'm close...I'm gonna…!" she pleaded in a high-pitched tone, her body getting hotter and hotter.

Lucena grinned evilly and, just when she was about make her climax, he stopped playing with her breast and removed her fingers, sitting back with her legs folded underneath her. Hikari stared at her with a look of betrayal on her face when she was left on the verge, and Lucena giggled at her reaction.

"Why'd you stop?" she asked.

"I just wanted to tease you is all." replied Lucena happily, Hikari frowning in response.

"That's not very nice, meanie." she said as Lucena vaulted herself over her until she was overtop of her on her hands and knees, her head positioned in between her legs.

She then eased her ass down so that as she used her mouth to pleasure Hikari, she would be able to as well.

"Let's feel good together, Hikari." said Lucena with lust in every syllable before she spread Hikari's legs apart and started to lick her vagina.

Hikari bit her lip to keep herself from crying out at how good that felt, but then she remembered what she had to do and immediately fought back. She wrapped her arms underneath and around Lucena's thighs and squeezed both of her ass cheeks tightly, catching her off guard and making Lucena squeal a little. Then she commenced to eat her out with her tongue, Lucena pausing for a moment to suck in a breath and make an attempt to keep herself in check against the waves of pleasure rushing through her system.

"Mm..yes, keep doing that…" she murmured before she returned to pleasuring Hikari, the two lovers engorging in one another.

And when Hikari murmured that she was nearing her climax again, Lucena didn't ease up to tease her again and at the last possible second she pulled away and grinned when Hikari tensed up and came, the wet sounds coming from her entrance as her juices came flowing out.

"Look's like your ready to go." said Lucena before she got up off of Hikari climbed off the bed, her lover watching her with a confused and somewhat disappointed expression since she couldn't finish what she started.

"What are you doing?" asked Hikari when Lucena opened one of her dresser drawers and dug around in it, looking for something specific.

"Ah, here it is." said Lucena as she glanced over at Hikari and pulled her hand out of the drawer, the object in her grasp making Hikari gasp.

"L-Lucena, is that a…" she asked with a stutter, the certain object she was referring to being a foot-long double ended dildo.

"I've been wanting to this this for a while now, to be honest." replied Lucena as she returned to the bed and climbed up on the opposite end near Hikari's feet.

Hikari watched with wide eyes as Lucena rubbed her clit to get herself wet, then moaned as she slid one end of the didlo into herself all the way to within a few inches of the halfway point. Then she stared into Hikari's eyes with lust as she got on her knees in between Hikari's outstretched legs and positioned the other tip of the dildo at her entrance.

"Let's become one."

Hikari slowly nod her head, accepting Lucena's offer without any argument, and winced a little when Lucena pushed the rubber dick past her folds all the way until their hips touched and the lips of their vaginas were kissing one another. They both moaned loudly at their connection, and before they could recover Lucena began to gyrate her hips back and forth, fucking Hikari and grinding against her at the same time to produce a mind-numbing feeling of ecstasy.

Their fluids mixed together the more they had sex, the pleasure so overwhelming that both Lucena and Hikari had started to drool. This was the farthest both of them had gone during one of their sexual escapades, and they weren't planning on stopping now, not for a good _long_ while.

 **\- The Next Day -**

After dragging themselves out of bed Lucena and Hikari went out into the city to go to the central hospital like Arthur had said, the tw wanting to know more about the offer he had proposed the previous day.

They arrived at a slower part of the day and were immediately taken by Arthur to a vacant room, the doctor that met with them carrying a metal case by his side. He was an older gentlemen with greying hair and glasses, as well as a slight stubble, but judging from his gaze when he smiled at the two they could both tell he must've been through some tough stuff.

"Greetings to the both of you, Great General, Hikari." he greeted them courteously with a handshake for them, Lucena and Hikari returning his smile. "What you two are about to undertake is a revolutionary new process that the Emperor and I have come up with, so to say the least I'm excited."

"Could you explain it to us a little more please? I want to know what we're getting ourselves into." asked Lucena as she held Hikari's hand.

"But of course. Doctor, would you do the honors?" said Arthur with a hand motion to the doctor, the man nodding as he set the case down on the nearby countertop covered with standard medical stuff like tongue depressors.

He opened the case and Lucena and Hikari gasped when he pulled out a pair of purple gloves and slide them over his hands, the two recognizing it as the Teigu Perfector, a relic from the Revolution where it was used previously by one of the original Jaegers, Dr. Stylish.

"Essentially what I'm going to do is very delicate work, but with these I'm able to do it with relatively no trouble whatsoever. Arthur speaks the truth, we've discovered a method that will allow same-sex couples, primarily female, to give birth to a child of their own without the addition of a consenting male." started the Doctor after crossing his arms. "Basically, one of you will provide a DNA sample that I will then manually splice into a collection of sperm cells, thereby overwriting its genetic makeup with the donors, and then whomever choose to bear the child will receive the sperm through the normal method of injection through the vagina into the uterus."

"You can do that?" questioned Hikari in awe, the doctor nodding his head and grinning slightly.

"Well, I guess that means we just need to decide who'll provide the sample and who'll be the bearer. Hikari?" asked Lucena of her partner.

Hikari without even hesitating offered to be the one to provide DNA, and when the doctor provided her with a orange plastic cup, she bid farewell for a few in order to go to the bathroom. A few minutes later she returned with a little redness in her cheeks, a giggle coming from Lucena as she watched her hand the cup to the Doctor.

"Thank you. Now, before I leave to begin the process, I need to know who will be the bearer." he said, Lucena quickly raising her hand.

"I'll do it."

"Splendid. If you'll come with me, Hikari you can wait outside in the waiting room. It shouldn't take too long."

Hikari nodded and left with Arthur to return to the waiting room and pick a seat. The clock ticked on for a good ten minutes before the same doors they had walked through earlier were opened, a happy Lucena walking out.

"How'd it go?" asked Hikari when she got up and went to her side.

"It was fine, you should've seen that doctor's hands fly with those gloves." replied Lucena before she looked down at her stomach and rubbed it gingerly. "But he said it was a resounding success...we're gonna have a baby."


	75. Epilogue

A/N Well, guys...this is it, the end. It's taken us a long time, but all good things have to come to an end. This story has been a remarkable one to write for you guys, and it's become one of my favorite. I promise I'll get all of the relevant information for this story up on the wiki asap, but as of right now, with this final upload, the curtain will drop on a Different Path.

Guys, from the depths of my heart I thank you for reading my story and for providing me with all of the awesome things you've said about it. So, as a final request, I ask that you leave your parting reviews here with your final thoughts on my story. Also I'll make sure to get all the last few pieces of information up on the wiki, with the first thing being the child of Lucena and Hikari!

Finally, to inform all of you that the pages have been updated, I'll be adding on a A/N chapter after this one at a later time.

Thank you all, and I will see you guys in the next story. DemonLordGalm, out!

* * *

 **Epilogue**

 **\- Nineteen Years Later -**

 **\- Imperial Cemetery -**

Lucena bent down in front of a certain grave and carefully removed the wilted roses resting in a vase next to it, replacing them with freshly cut ones that she got weekly. Once they were arranged how she liked them Lucena stood back up and returned to Hikari's side, the two smiling at the name engraved on the marker within the shrine.

" _I hope you're doing okay Sis._ " thought Lucena before she turned around and held hands with HIkari as they left the shrine.

"So what shall we do now?" asked Hikari, Lucena rubbing her chin a little and shrugging.

"I dunno. I was thinking of calling Juno and Morgan over from Straelka for a little get together. What are your thoughts?"

"That sounds great. It's gotten a little lonely around the house ever since your parents left for that trip to the north, and since Pyrrha departed for her tour." replied Hikari.

As they left the cemetery they both looked to the east from where they were standing, the smiles on their faces full of pride for what their daughter had become.

 **\- Southeastern Sea -**

"Set up shop here! Drop anchor!"

"Aye sir!"

A naval captain by the name of Auston Faulkner grinned as he shoved his hands into his hoodie pockets and watched the crewmen scramble in response to his orders. The ship he was standing on was a first in so many classes, it the first battleship ever constructed by the Empire, it was the first warship built using techniques and design protocols from Straelka, and it was also the first seaborn _and_ largest Teigu constructed since the Shikoutazer.

It's christened name was "God of the Raging Ocean: Aegaeon" and it was a massive white, blue and grey battleship with four turrets, each with two high-pressure water cannons that were connected to pumps built into the belly of the ship that sucked up water into internal storage wells that would be fired through the barrels. The blasts were so powerful the stream could cut easily through almost anything, and if required they could also fire conventional ammunition.

The conning tower was the tallest point on the ship and home to the observation deck, the bridge was located a few decks below a large smoke stack, and a second conning tower was near the rear-half of the ship between the third and fourth turret.

It was a wonderfully crafted ship, and Auston was proud to serve on it as Captain, but unfortunately he was not the one in control of the massive Teigu. That right was reserved for the Grand Admiral and self-pronounced Queen of the Sea herself, the daughter of the famed Great General that defeated a god-like Danger Beast and granddaughter of the equally famous former General Esdeath.

" _It's not like I care, really. Serving on this ship is good enough for me!_ " thought Auston with a grin as he observed the ship from the bridge, his attire not even close to matching the officers there with him.

While they wore neat naval uniforms, he was dressed utterly casual with maroon slippers, baggy black and blue athletic pants, a simple grey t-shirt, and a thick white and black hoodie with a blue fur collar. Despite his lackluster appearance as a commissioned officer, he was physically fit and had messy maroon hair, fair skin, and a single red and blue eye.

" _Now, if I were Pyrrha, where would I be…_ "

He only looked for a couple of seconds before he spotted the Grand Admiral herself, and he facepalmed when he saw her resting on a reclining pool chair on top of the second turret facing the bow. She had her cap sitting on the side with the rest of her clothes, the young woman of twenty resting under the brightly shining sun in nothing but a black bikini set.

"That's my Pyrrha…" he murmured under his breath as he left the bridge to go to her.

Pyrrha sunbathing on the ship in such a skimpy outfit wasn't at all unorthodox for her or for the crew, in fact, it was pretty much a normal everyday occurrence. There were a lot of times when Pyrrha would walk the decks of the Aegaeon in her bikini wear, and it came as a big shock to the crew because Pyrrha herself told them all straight up that she was actually very fond of showing off her body.

" _Khehe, that's just code for her being a very sexual person. I'm just glad everyone's gotten used to it._ " thought Auston with a smirk, a memory of when Pyrrha had decided to not a single piece of clothing while surfing one day when they were stationed off the coast of a tropical island. " _And it was truly a beautiful sight to behold…_ "

He stepped out through a door onto the deck and looked up to the second turret, smirking when he saw that she had frozen the ladder built into the machine to prevent anyone from reaching her as she sunbathed.

"Typical." he muttered before he removed his right hand from his pocket and pulled out a small ring from his pants pocket, the silver object sliding onto his ring finger and twinkling.

He clenched his fist once the ring was on and from the side of the ship rose up a column of water that lifted him up off the deck and up to the turret. Once his feet touched the smooth metal finish of the turret the water returned to its source and Auston grinned as he approached the resting Pyrrha from her left.

"Thanks for freezing the ladder so I couldn't climb up the normal way, Pyrrha." he said with a chuckle, the Grand Admiral cracking open a single silver eye and smiling.

"I knew you had Black Marlin, so you could get up here on your own. Ahd I just wanted to make sure I didn't have anyone peeping." replied Pyrrha, Auston's grin dropping when he pointed his thumb over his shoulder at the command bridge windows.

"You say that while you're practically out in the open where anyone on the conning tower can see you. And when you walk around the ship in that outfit practically every three days...and when you've walked around the ship utterly naked..."

Pyrrha stuck her tongue out at him and lifted herself up off the chair in order to receive her clothes from Auston when he handed them to her. First she slipped on her high-heeled boots that reached up to her mid-thigh, then the unique open-top white and black jacket that left her breasts completely exposed except for the black bikini she wore. She attached the jacket to her boots with four strap clips and then slipped on a black mini skirt with a brown belt that was long enough to cover what was important. Then she put on her two arm sleeves, a pair of black gloves, and then finally the cap she wore around her shoulders and the admiral's cap atop her head.

Auston had returned his hand to his pocket and watched with his regular grin at how even though she was now clothed, to say the least, Pyrrha was still an extremely beautiful woman, a trait she inherited from her parents. From Lucena she got her silver eyes and long blue hair, the color from her grandmother, which framed the sides of her face with two locks, but instead of letting it hang freely without any restraint she kept it tied in a ponytail. Other things she inherited from Lucena was large breasts every girl in her family seemed to have, and the tattoo in the center of her chest just above her cleavage that marked her as a user of Demon's Extract, only here recently that mark was referred to more as the mark of someone who inherited the abilities of Wintorra and the ice dragons, the information of the Four Horsemen and the Great War now common knowledge.

The only difference between Lucena's and hers was that Pyrrha had added her own flare to it by getting two wing-like tattoos on either side of the mark to make it stand out more.

"So, we've reached the area I assume?" she asked as they walked together to the ladder that she had frozen, a snap of the fingers causing the ice to dissipate.

"Yes, now all we have to do is wait and see if it appears." replied Auston as he went down first, and then offered a hand to Pyrrha when he was at the bottom to help her down.

"Oh my, what a gentleman." she said with a laugh as she allowed herself to be carried by Auston at the hips and set down on her feet, the captain grinning at her.

They walked the ship together to make sure everything was in order, stopping frequently to say hello to any passing crewmember, before Pyrrha and Auston returned to the conning tower to find their rooms and get some sleep after the long overnight journey. Along the way, as each crewmember greeted him as Captain and her as Grand Admiral or ma'am, Auston could only smile at how he reserved the exclusive right to call her by her own name rather then her title.

" _One of the many perks that come with being in a relationship with her._ " he thought to himself with a snicker.

Pyrrha heard him when they reached their bunks and placed a hand on her hip, asking, "What's got you so happy?"

Auston shrugged and gave her his usual grin with a wink, "Oh you know, I'm just happy that I get to be with such a beautiful girl like yourself."

He was caught off guard when Pyrrha took a step to get right up in his face and grinned half mischievously, half evilly when she cupped his right cheek and sensually licked his left cheek while her eyes blazed with a hidden and unrivaled lust.

"You're damn right about that…" she whispered into his ear before she stepped back and returned to being her normal bubbly self, a little wave her only goodbye to Auston before she disappeared into her quarters.

"Damn, she is sexy." said Auston to himself before he reached out for the handle of his door, the captain wanting to get at least an hour of shuteye.

Unfortunately for the him the entire ship rocked back and forth when something *immensely large hit the underside, Auston actually having to support himself on the wall with his hands in order to not fall down from the force of the impact. He raced to a porthole window at the end of the hallway that looked out the starboard side of the ship and gasped when a massive shark-like Danger Beast leaped out of the water a couple hundred meters away from the Aegaeon.

"Pyrrha! It's here!" shouted Auston at the top of his lungs, his cry reaching her through her door and bringing her back out into the hallway.

"Really? Then let's go get it then!' she exclaimed after flying out of her room with an expression radiating excitement for the thrill of battle.

The two sprinted through the bowels of the ship to the deck, where their men were already at work preparing to lift the anchor so they could pursue the giant shark Danger Beast. Ever since the God Danger Beast was slain, the disappearance of its power caused other powerful Danger Beasts that were afraid to show themselves out of fear made them pop up around the globe, and it was their job to subjugate them whenever they appeared to protect anyone threatened by them.

This specific shark-like one, codenamed "Leviathan" was being a threat to trade ships between the Empire and Straelka, so she and Auston were tasked to eliminate it. And they sure as hell weren't gonna let it go.

"Aegaeon! Activate!" bellowed Pyrrha as she slammed her palm to the deck, the entire ship suddenly coming to life when she took full control and commanded it to raise the anchor itself and move forward after the shark.

Unfortunately the ship's engines weren't powerful enough to keep up at a steady pace, so Auston took out Black Marlin and then thrust his right hand forward while gripping his wrist, the water surrounding Aegaeon bubbling and frothing as he commanded it to push against the ship and speed it up.

Leviathan roared when it saw them gaining on it, so it dove underneath the water and just narrowly avoid the water blasts from the front two turrets to avoid being attacked again. Auston laughed however, took off his hoodie, and winked at Pyrrha before he dove off the ship into the water.

"Oi, that man…" she muttered under her breath as she crossed her arms and waited for him to reappear, wincing a little and adjusting her skirt a second later.

A few minutes of silence coupled with the sound of the waves hitting the side of the ship creeped by until a massive plume of water exploded upwards to the left of the Aegaeon, Leviathan first appearing with several water dragons wrapped around its body and Auston coming up afterwards.

"Pyrrha, now!" he yelled as he used some of the water surrounding him to create some wings and fly away from the Danger Beast, giving Pyrrha to opening she needed to end its life.

She smirked as wings of ice emerged from her back and she zoomed towards Leviathan, her entire right arm encasing itself in ice to become something along the lines of a lance or spear.

"Kalt Speer!" she said before her wings folded up and she plunged the ice through Leviathan's neck, shooting out through the other side and causing an array of razor sharp icicles to explode out from within the shark and shred it from the inside out.

As Leviathan fell past her towards the sea, Auston looked at Pyrrha and caught a glimpse at something not many people had the chance to see and he grinned mischievously.

" _Oh so it's one of those days, huh?_ " he thought to himself as Pyrrha created a huge block of ice for the now dead Danger Beast to rest on, the crew of her ship cheering when they all realized what was going to come next.

"Fish fry!"

Day turned to night, and the ship was turned into a part boat that was crowded with happy sailors chowing down on the cooked meat of the dead Leviathan, and all the while they were having a good time drinking some alcohol with their commanding officers. Auston, not very much a drinker, smirked when Lucena downed her third beer and called it a night, saying goodbye to the men she was talking with before heading off to find her room.

Auston quickly joined her side to prevent her from tripping on anything since she was tad bit tipsy, and held her by the hand into the ship's interior. However, instead of bringing her to her room, he suddenly lifted her up into his arms and carried her into a nearby elevator that connected to all of the floors of the conning tower.

"Where are we going?" she asked, Auston glancing down at her and winking.

"To the observation tower."

"Why?"

Auston, when the elevator doors opened into the empty observation tower, a spacious room that looked like a miniature command bridge, and set her back down on her feet close to the windows overlooking the entire ship. They were far enough up and it was dark enough to where no one could see them unless they focused exceptionally hard, but its not anyone would be

"Because someone decided to be a little naughty today." replied Auston with a snicker before he pushed softly on her back and bent her over, Pyrrha's cheeks turning red at the vulnerable position.

Auston used his index finger to lift up Pyrrha's skirt and she looked back in embarrassment, the Captain staring at her exposed ass and the black pair of panties that she must've have slipped on in the short duration of time that took place between her entering her room and leaving with him to tackle Leviathan. The only difference however, was what he had caught with his eye earlier when she had flown over him.

"Pyrrha, what's this?" he asked playfully as he touched a fairly large bulge hidden underneath her panties, Pyrrha reacting by wincing a little and sucking in a breath.

"N-Nothing…" she replied, but another prod by Auston caused her to whimper and wiggle her legs a little.

"Nothing? Are you sure…?" asked Auston slowly when he pulled down Pyrrha's panties, the fabric sliding down her smooth skin to her knees, and gently touched the two cylindrical objects protruding from her vagina and asshole. "These don't seem to be nothing."

"F-Fine, you m-meanie…" murmured Pyrrha as she pressed her hands against the glass in order to keep herself balanced. "They're vibrators...there, I said it, are you happy now?"

"What a naughty girl you are, having vibrators while your walking out and about in public." teased Auston with a wide grin as Pyrrha bit her lip and drooled a little bit when he slowly moved the vibrator in her vagina around in a circular motion to stimulate her even more.

"Mmm, p-please stop, if you keep doing that, I'll...I'll…" she pleaded, but Auston disregarded her and instead continued to stimulate her, switching to the second vibrator in her asshole and doing the same thing. "Ohhhh my god! Hngh...that's sensitive, oh!"

Auston pressed his attack by reached around to her chest and pulled on the knot of her bikini, untying it and freeing her large breasts from confinement so he could squeeze and play with them with his other hand. Unable to withhold her pleasure any longer, Pyrrha moaned loudly and buckled her knees a little, the sensation of a climax growing bigger and bigger inside of her.

"A-Auston...I'm gonna…"

Auston moved his hand back to the first vibrator and started thrusting it back and forth against her inner walls, the soft squishing sound reaching Pyrrha's ears and turning her on even more. Her inner thighs were drenched with her fluids, and she was now begging Auston to finish her off.

He complied and quickened his pace, Pyrrha sticking out her tongue in pure ecstasy when the growing feeling in the pit of her stomach finally reaching a boiling point, and finally with a loud moan she climaxed.

A copious amount of her juices came flowing out from her aroused sex, soaking the vibrator ad creating a small puddle on the floor between her feet. With heavy breaths Pyrrha turned to look back at Auston and licked her lips, her eyes and expression broadcasting unrestricted lust relatable only to that of an animal.

"Now it's _my_ turn…" she said in a sing-song tone when she got on her knees in front of Auston and pulled his pants and boxers down.

As the two vibrators continued to mess up the inner walls of her vagina and asshole, she began to stroke her lover's erect dick with her hands and tongue. When it was ready she latched her lips around his head and sucked, her tongue gently prodding it. Then she slowly took in his entire length, his head part way down her throat, and started to give him a blowjob.

Her head bobbed back and forth, slurping every so often, as she played with her breasts to give herself more pleasure while Auston clenched his teeth and grinned.

"Pyrrha, I…"

She sped up in her motion, and a few moments later her efforts were rewarded by a thick stream of cum that she hungrily gulped down. But she wasn't satisfied yet, once Auston was done she continued the suck on his cock, her desires spurring her on.

Auston ejaculated in her mouth a second time, then a third, and a fourth until finally after the fifth time Pyrrha removed her lips from his cock and swallowed the last few drops of his semen and licked her lips clean,

"Mm...delicious…" she murmured as she got back to her feet and turned around. "Please, I want it in here too…"

Her panties had already been tossed to the side and she bent over with one hand on the glass window, spread her feet shoulder width apart, and used her other hand to grip one of her ass cheeks and pull back a little to tempt Auston.

Auston nod his head and grabbed the vibrator in her vagina, taking out the six-inch long dick-shaped sex toy and throwing it away while he left the one in her asshole alone. With one hand on her hip and the other at her breasts, Auston thrust his dick into her and moved back and forth at a quick pace. Their thighs made a soft slapping noise when they connected, and Pyrrha squealed in delight every time she felt his dick slide in and out of her wet folds, stretching it little by little.

"Oh...ohh, _yes_! Your dick is the best! Fuck me harder, mess me up!" begged Pyrrha, Auston's sex drive going through the roof as a result.

He slammed into her with vigor, Pyrrha's moans of pleasure coupled with his grunt creating some kind of symphony that they moved along to with their hearts, bodies and minds. Her love fluids lubricated his member so that it made it effortless to slide in and out of her, and he couldn't help but play around with her huge tits, the soft mounds melting in his hands.

He gently pinched the pink nipple of her right breast and she whimpered a little, the magic his thumb and index finger were weaving into her body through their soft gently touch on one of her sensitive areas mind-numbing.

Auston felt the pressure grow to a breaking point and with a final push he went as deep as he could go, all the way to her womb, and decorated every part of it with his semen.

As they stood there hunched over one another with sweat beads falling from their brows and tired breaths escaping their lips, Auston pulled out of Pyrrha and let out a sigh of relief.

"Whew...I'm beat. You sure are a beast when it comes to sex, damn…" he said with a lopsided grin, Pyrrha snickering in response.

"I don't know what you're talking about. Besides, you're the one who was using my vibrators against me." she countered as she pulled out the one from her ashole and shivered as it was removed.

They both laughed and Auston pulled up a chair for him to sit in, Pyrrha joining him by sitting down on his lap so they could both look out the windows at the twinkling stars.

"I love you Pyrrha."

"I love you too, Auston"

They shared a kiss and Pyrrha grinned a little when she reached between his legs and stroked his dick again, waiting for it to become erect until she lifted her ass up and sat down on it, taking in his dick all the way. Auston grabbed her breasts and continued to kiss her as she rode him slowly, the pleasure carrying them on into the night.

 **\- Imperial Capital -**

 **\- One Week Later -**

"Welcome guys!" exclaimed Lucena happily as she and Hikari stood in front off the doors to their home, Morgan, Juno and their daughter by the name of Electrichika walking up to them with smiles.

Juno and Morgan had confessed to one another a month after Lucena and Hikari were married, and soon after they too married, connecting their family to the Royal Family of Straelka and strengthening the bond between the Empire and their eastern neighbor.

As a result, Juno officially became a princess of Straelka and would reign as Kaiserin alongside Morgan when it came time for his parents to step down from the throne. As such, Juno left her role as Prime Minister to Lubbock and moved to Straelka.

While there, she gave birth to Electrichika, a fiery girl who grew up into a beautiful nineteen year old woman. Her hair was predominantly reddish pink, like her grandmother Camilla, then it changed to lavender like her mother, and finally turned to white at the very tips of her hair. She also had her grandmother's silver eyes and her voluptuous figure, a trait that also came in strong from Juno and her family, which she flaunted proudly with the outfit she wore.

With a toothy grin, her canines slightly longer then the rest of her teeth, she asked, "Where's Pyrrha? Is she home?"

Before either Lucena or Hikari could answer her, they all heard a laugh from above and looked up to see an ecstatic Pyrrha and a smiling Auston soar toward them on the back of an ice dragon.

"Hello!" she bellowed at the top of her lungs when she stopped the dragon above the front yard and jumped with Auston, coming to land next to Juno on her left after free-falling around twenty five feet.

"Elly!"

"Pyrrha!"

The two close friends hugged one another tightly while Auston went up to Lucena and Hikari, giving a hug to each of them, and then gave Morgan a little salute.

"Hey everyone. Man it's good to be back on solid ground." said Auston after hugging Juno.

"Did you two find that Danger Beast? Leviathan?" asked Morgan as he crossed his arms.

"Yeah, he turned out to be a pretty tasty meal." replied Pyrrha with a wink, Electrichika snickering.

"Okay, okay, we can talk more inside. Come on everyone." said Lucena as she beckoned them all inside.

As they had a good time, across the globe Tatsumi and Esdeath were having a pleasant time enjoying a meal with Jacqueline, Kahfka and his son Roman, who by now had found a wife of his own. The former bitter enemies were sharing laughs with one another, which was almost like a dream considering their past.

It was the beginning of a new age, and it could only get better from here.


	76. Update

Everyone! Good news! The Prologue for the next fanfic, **Akame ga Kill! ' Judecca Rising** , has just been posted and is waiting for you to read it! Get your asses over there and tell me what you think!

\- _DemonLordGalm_

 _FanFicCollective Founder and Admin_

 _Lord of Salt_

 _General Badass_


	77. Update 2

Hey guys I know I havnt updated this in a while since its you know, finished, but I wanted to tell you guys that if you want to see all of my characters pictures from A Different Path and my second AgK fanfic, **Judecca Rising** , then Im going to be making a Discord server where I will have all of them on there as well as a place where you guys, my readers, can personally talk to me without having to deal with the hassle of fanfictions emails and crud. If you're interested **PLEASE CONTACT ME!** I'd really like to meet all of you!


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